The Infinitely Curious Woman
by A plus
Summary: “The boy is a Horcrux. In order for Voldemort to be truly gone, the boy must die.” But his deal had never been with Dumbledore, it had always been with Lily. By teaching Granger the Dark Arts, he could corrupt Potter's soul and save his life. SSHG
1. The Fall of Man

The Infinitely Curious Woman

_A/N: I am changing when Dumbledore told Snape about Harry being a Horcrux to when Snape was still their Defense Against the Dark Arts Teacher. I'm wrapping up a longer story and have 4 different "first chapters" written for others. I think I'm going to post a few of them and pick my next story based on the responses I get.  
_

* * *

The wind whipped through his black hair as the potions master strode across the grounds of Hogwarts. The storm clouds gathered overhead, but no rain fell. His black boots fell in heavy steps on the soft soil, treading down the tall grass. He wore his characteristic black robes and scowl. Usually he was cautious, aware of his surroundings, but today the words echoing in his mind held his full attention.

_"The boy is a Horcrux. In order for Voldemort to be truly gone, the boy must die…by the Dark Lord's own wand."_

The words, the terrible words twisted through his thoughts as he made his way back to the castle. The Headmaster had had a talk with him, had revealed to him a part, the crucial part, of his plans. It had caught Severus by surprise. He had thought, all those years, that he was keeping the boy alive for _her_, not as a weapon, not as a sacrifice. He had been to hell and back, had done everything that Dumbledore had asked him to do…and it was all for nothing.

But his deal had never been with Dumbledore, it had always been with _her_. He had sworn to keep Harry Potter alive at all costs. He had sworn this to Lily even though she was already gone. If that now meant going against Albus Dumbledore, then so be it. If the only way to make sure that Harry Potter was kept alive was to bring him to Voldemort's side and let the wizarding world destroy itself then that was what needed to be done.

The dark professor was summoned that night and left Hogwarts to meet the Dark Lord. He informed the Headmaster, who greeted his departure with a short nod. The potions master stared at the old man with distain. He would betray this man tonight, this man who he had faithfully served for almost two decades. The headmaster had pushed him further and further and he had finally reached his breaking-point.

Unlike the first time he had switched sides, this one would involve no open declarations of loyalty. He had been paying false loyalty to one master and true loyalty to the other; he would merely exchange their places. No one would know that he was switching sides tonight except himself. Taking a deep breath, he stepped into the Dark Lord's chamber.

What proceeded was an hour-and-a-half of mind-numbingly dull meeting. He stood side-by-side between his fellow Death Eaters as the Dark Lord paced back and forth in front of them, calling on them to report and informing them of their duties. Severus' heart raced. What he was about to do could get him killed. He had a find a way to get the Dark Lord to listen to what he had to say so that he could get it all out before the wizard started crucio-ing him.

"Severus." He heard his name being called. "What do you have for me?"

"A suggestion."

The Dark Lord gazed at him sharply. He did not take kindly to suggestions and Severus knew that. _For Lily_, he reminded himself. He was doing this for Lily.

"What sort of a suggestion?" the wizard asked coldly.

"A change in tactics."

He felt the wizards to either side of his flinch. They knew what was coming.

"You are my spy, Severus. When I want your advice, I shall ask for it." The Dark Lord raised his wand.

The potions master lowered his voice.

"I wish to speak with you about Horcruxes."

The Dark Lord paused, his raised wand focused on Severus.

"Leave us," he hissed and the other Death Eaters immediately vacated the room.

When the door shut firmly behind the last one of them, the Dark Lord looked at him sharply, waiting for him to speak. And of all the things the dark wizard expected to hear, the words uttered next caught him by surprise.

"You must not kill Harry Potter."

It was a high-pitched mirthless laugh.

"You must be joking, Severus." There was something that could be described as a cruel smile on the Dark Lord's face, as if he could already taste the man's upcoming pain.

Severus knew he had to speak quickly before he was hexed unable to do so.

"He is a horcrux. You made him a horcrux. To kill him would be to bring yourself one step closer to death."

The Dark Lord's smile disappeared and he lowered his wand. He was aware that this was not a joke.

"The night in Godric's Hollow?"

"Yes."

"But I didn't…"

"It doesn't matter. It still happened."

"This information is coming from Dumbledore?"

"Yes."

The snake-like wizard stood thoughtfully for a few minutes. Finally, he walked over to the large leaded-glass window. Gazing out it, he spoke.

"The boy will kill me."

"Make him not want to." Severus stepped forward. The Dark Lord was listening. It was time to reveal the rest of his plan.

"And how do you propose to do this?"

"Bring him to your side. Bring him to the dark."

"I have tried…"

"A weak attempt lacking completely in Slytherin subtlety." He knew he probably would have been killed on the spot for this comment had not the Dark Lord been eagerly waiting to hear the rest of his plan.

"And how exactly do _you_ propose to accomplish it?"

Severus left his place and walked over to stand beside the Dark Lord at the window.

"How much do you know of muggle religion?" He asked in a low voice, already knowing the answer.

"I grew up in a muggle orphanage, we were taught the Bible…"

"Then you know about the fall of man."

The Dark Lord watched him in anticipation, waiting for the way he planned to corrupt the very soul of the man who had evaded him for so long. Half-remembered images from his childhood of gardens and snakes and apples swam in his vision. He waited for his spy to reveal to him the path that would allow him to corrupt his rival's very soul.

Severus spoke slowly, a dark gleam in his eye.

"It's always the woman….the infinitely curious woman…"

* * *

The next afternoon he sat at his desk in the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, watching her. Her sharp quill scratched quickly across the parchment as she worked of her essay. Her bottom lip was caught between her lip in concentration. Glancing around to make sure that all the students were focused on their schoolwork, he continued his open appraisal of her. A ray of sunlight streamed through the window and landed on her face as she tucked a stray curl of soft brown hair behind her ear. In the afternoon sunlight, she looked like an angel. She was his target, his bridge to Harry Potter's soul. He studied her intently; there was a brightness in her eyes, an eagerness, an innocence.

He would destroy her.

It wasn't that he wanted to; he regretted it even. She had so much potential, so much intelligence and ambition. Who knew how far she might go…if not for the intervention he was planning. He regretted it, but he knew it must be done. He would never be able to lure Potter into the dark arts…not without her.

He would crack her soul, her shiny, precious, innocent soul.


	2. The Serpent

_A/N: Some of you are worried about Hermione. Just trust me, this isn't going to get tooo dark. We all know she can take care of herself._

* * *

He knew what kind of student she was. He knew what she would need in the first week of the semester. There was no need to seek her out…she would come to him.

He was right.

As she stood before his desk, his dark eyes scanned the form she had handed him.

"An independent study?" He asked mockingly.

"Yes," she replied tersely, as if waiting for the mocking that would follow.

He could see that she had already gotten all her other teachers to sign it, that she had saved him for last. Had she been dreading this? Was she nervous he would say no? At the top, the chosen area of study was filled in with small, tight script.

"Transfiguration?" He raised an eyebrow and surveyed the young woman before him carefully.

"Yes," she shifted her weight but held his gaze.

"I'm surprised," he drawled slowly, almost casually and was rewarded with a hesitantly curious look on her face.

"You never seemed like a student who would narrow down their interests so quickly, who would focus on one form of magic above all others."

"I….well, it's not exactly that I'm not interested in other branches of magic…I just don't really have any choice."

He allowed his posture to relax slightly, to make her feel more comfortable. For added effect, he let out a frustrated sigh.

"Yes, Hogwarts is rather… restrictive in its categorizations."

"Yes," she said, looking at him strangely, as if finding it completely unbelievable that he would have the same thoughts as she let alone discuss them with her.

"There is one class however, that breaks these artificial boundaries."

He saw the questioning tilt of her head as she turned to look at him and he knew he had her.

"It was why I studied the Dark Arts. Defense Against the Dark Arts is the one class at Hogwarts that combines all the others…potions, spells, beasts, everything."

There was a fire in her eyes now…one that unlike all her other teachers, he had never bothered to ignite…had tried to smother even. He saw her desire, her ache to learn.

The fire sparked dangerously, recklessly. The fire was waiting for fuel, waiting to become an inferno. And he was going to throw dry brush on it.

He would teach her….yes…he would teach her.

It almost seemed too easy.

He continued.

"I'm surprised, honestly. I have always thought of you as a practical girl and these being times of war and with your proximity to Potter, I would have thought you would have taken more of an interest in Defense."

His tone was soft yet scathing. She reacted immediately.

"It's not that I'm not interested…"

He kept silent, encouraging her to continue.

"I never would have thought you would agree to act as my advisor," she confessed.

He knew it was time.

Pulling out his wand, he made a show of casting a silencing charm on his office…as if he hadn't already cast one wandlessly as soon as she entered. As if it wasn't already too deep in the dungeons for anyone to hear.

He sat down behind his desk and accio'd a small wooden chair from the corner for her to sit in. She glanced at him nervously.

When they were both seated, he spoke to her in a low voice.

"You know, I suspect, of my position in this war?" Dumbledore had told Potter of his position as a spy and if Potter knew anything, the girl did as well.

"Yes," she whispered, eyes wide as if unsure whether or not she was permitted to have this knowledge.

"Then you know that my position, that my life would be better protected if you and Potter were better protected…if your knowledge of defense against the dark arts was more extensive."

"Yes," she breathed.

So desperate to help. So typically Gryffindor. His quill scratched quickly against the parchment, leaving behind his signature is dark red ink.

He held it out to her. She grabbed it and quickly left.

x

x

She came to his office again on Wednesday.

He led her into his study this time. She sat on the smooth, worn brown leather sofa as he paced slowly around the dark bookshelves which lined the walls of the small room. The dark wooden shelves were lit only by a few torches on the wall illuminating the numerous volcumes. He watched her out of the corner of his eye. She seemed to be holding her breath

He hesitated every few strides, giving her the impression that he was searching for a particular volume when in fact he knew exactly where to find the book he sought.

Finally he slowly lifted it from the shelf where he had carefully placed it earlier in the evening.

He set it down on the wooden table in front of her.

She touched the cover slowly with one finger as her eyes scanned the title.

There was a key word missing from the cover.

Her tone was hesitant but blunt.

"This isn't a defense book."

"No….it is not."

She looked up at him with uncertain brown eyes.

"This is a Dark Arts text."

"Yes."

She hesitated and he stepped closer to where she sat.

"In order to find the cure, you have to understand the disease." It was the kind of logic she would understand.

Her hand traced over the smooth, leather cover of the book, the dusty, glittering silver text on the smooth black cover.

This was the moment and they both knew it. If she opened that book, she was in. They would both be breaking the rules, breaking the law, venturing into territory that could get them both arrested or killed. By opening that Dark Arts book, she was willingly entering into this situation. There would be no going back.

He watched as her fingers slowly traced the silver letters of the title as her mind was lost in thought.

She slowly raised her head, meeting his gaze.

"What makes you think I would agree to this?"

"You've never been afraid of the restricted section. Afraid of getting caught, maybe, afraid of physical harm from the books themselves, but never afraid of the knowledge you would find in them."

It was true. He blamed it on her muggle upbringing, on her parents. He had spent enough time in the muggle world to know what dentists were. It might have been different if her parents were religious people, or even artists, but they were scientists. Hermione Granger had been raised in a world of science in which knowledge was the highest good. The idea that knowledge could be dark, corruptive, harmful was something she had never been able to accept.

It wasn't that she had never been warned against reading Dark books. Hadn't Dumbledore make it clear, hadn't Mrs. Weasley had a talk with her as they had cleaned out the Blacks' library? It wasn't that she didn't know, it was that she believed she was above it, that she was smarter than it. How arrogant...how Gryffindor.

She opened the book cover, slowly turning it so that it sat on the table. He saw her throat rise as she swallowed deeply and he knew she was aware of the meaning of her action. She didn't look at him. She looked down at the table her eyes drawn to the letters on the page. Her heart raced as her eyes soaked in the forbidden letters, black ink against the dense white of the page.

He leaned in and she felt his warm breath against her ear as she read.

"The things you read, the things I teach you, you are not to speak of it with anyone…except Potter. Any knowledge you gain that you feel would be beneficial to him…you may share with him and only him. No one else knows."

She nodded, having already assumed as much.

As she read, she heard the door slam shut behind her as he left her in his study with the book.


	3. The Dark Thrill of it

_For Lily, he reminded himself. He was doing this for Lily._

Hermione Granger arrived at his office at 7 precisely. This was their routine for Monday and Thursday nights. Opening the door, he guided her through to his office, leaving her to the reading material he had set out for her on the table. Some nights he would sit at his desk and grade papers as she read and scribbled furious notes, but tonight was one of the nights that he brewed in his lab while she worked alone in his office.

She liked it better this way. She had always liked working alone. The weight of his gaze, the force of his presence in the room always made her nervous. It took her twice as long to read when he was there.

She copied a spell into her notes and carefully practiced the wand movements indicated in the ancient text. It was a slicing hex, a dark one. She moved her wand with two quick flicks followed by a slower circular motion.

"Cast it," she heard a voice say from behind her and jumped in her seat, turning to see the \black-robed man in the doorway, leaning against the frame and watching her.

"Cast it," he spoke again and she took a deep breath. Up until this point, her education in the dark arts had been purely theoretical. She felt a strange apprehension in the pit of her stomach about casting a dark curse, but her mind cut in, overpowering the feeling. _It's not like it's an unforgivable curse_, she told herself, _and after all, what is theory worth without learning the practical applications?_

He levitated a pillow up from the couch and told her, "When you cast it, make a wider wand motion."

Taking a deep breath, she made the motion once more with her wand and whispered the incantation. She could feel her magic being pulled from a place deeper within herself than it normally came. It came up through her body with a force she had not anticipated, causing her stomach to roll and her hand to tremble. It felt wrong, horribly, wrong. She was flooded with a sense of darkness as the magic snaked through her body.

The pillow instantly split in two and fell to the floor. She stared at the pile of white feathers that now littered the ground. It was an eerie juxtaposition between the violence of the spell and what looked to be the remnants of a pillow fight. She was fully aware that if that had been a person, it would be blood. Her wand was still clutched tightly in her sweaty hand, shaking.

"Well done, Miss Granger," came a voice behind her, snapping her out of her thoughts and causing her to jump slightly. Had she forgotten he was there?

She spun to face him, her wand still out. She was breathing hard and the adrenaline still pumping in her veins was making her feel shaky and lightheaded.

He had a look on his face that she had seen before on the faces of others…but never on him. She had seen it on McGonnogal's when she had pulled off a particularly difficult transfiguration; she had seen if on Flitwick's when she had performed a charm that was usually not taught at Hogwarts; she had seen it on Vector's when she had solved an arithmancy problem that even some of the top arithmancy masters had never dared…but she had never seen it on Snape's face. A part of her was exhilarated and the other part was terrified.

She didn't even know she had left the room until she found herself walking down the corridor. Everything seemed blurry and jagged. She walked quickly until she had made it around the corner, stopping as soon as she was out of view, leaning back against the stone wall. As her head rested on the hard surface, she closed her eyes and tried to slow her breathing.

What was she doing? What was she doing? What the _hell_ was she doing?

She took a deep breath and told herself the truth: She was learning dark spells from a death eater.

She took another deep breath and tried to stop her heart from racing. What the hell was she getting herself into?

She knew better than this…didn't she?

For Harry, she reminded herself. She was doing this to help Harry. But another voice deep inside called her out of her lie. You're _doing this for yourself_, it told her_, you and your damn curiosity_. There were things out there that she didn't know and when offered that knowledge, she couldn't turn away. She had watched some horror movies on television during the summer at her parents' house. They terrified her and she had wanted to shut her eyes, had wanted to turn off the TV…but she hadn't. She had sat and watched until the end because that part of her _had_ to know.

She looked down at her shaking hands.

This was…not how she had expected it to feel. What had she expected? She had expected it to feel dirty, to feel wrong, to feel like she was going against the very nature of the world. Instead, as much as she hated to admit it to herself, it had felt almost good. She actually liked the feeling. She liked the flood of power through her wand, the way it made her heart race.

And if she was really being honest with herself, she liked the way _he_ made her feel too. The stern teacher who had always ignored her waving hand, who had always told her to sit down and shut up was now paying attention to her. He was teaching her, challenging her more than anyone ever had. And for the first time in her life, he was actually praising her.

This was bad and she knew it. She knew that she shouldn't, that she couldn't be doing this alone. She had to tell someone. She and Ron had been starting to spend a lot of time together this year, but telling Ron was out of the question. He would never understand. Ron had been brought up with tales of the evils of the Dark Arts. But Harry…she saw the way his gaze lingered on the Dark Arts books as they passed through the restricted section. Harry might understand.

Back in the dungeon, Severus sat at his desk staring at the closed door she had exited only minutes before. She was…not what he had expected.

He hadn't meant to push her in to actually casting the spells so soon, but he had walked in on her practicing the hand motions. He had seen the perfect grace in the motions, the attention to detail and he had wanted to see if she could do it. She had. She had cast the spell perfectly.

He had expected her to protest, to put up more of a fight. He had expected her to falter, to go through the motions without the full power of the spell behind her, but she had performed it flawlessly.

His gaze traveled to the pile of feathers still on the floor and the remnants of the pillow ripped cleanly in two.

He had seen the fear he had expected, but he had seen something else too.

There had been a spark in her eye. The spark made him second-guess everything. Maybe he had been wrong about her. She had never been as innocent as he had assumed. After all, Polyjuice Potion was technically classified as a dark potion and she had brewed it in her second year. Had they all praised her intelligence and missed the more obvious implication?

She had been friends with Viktor Krum, after all, and students at Durmstrang were taught the Dark Arts. Had her friend already started her down the path?

Reaching into his desk, he withdrew a bottle of firewhisky and poured himself a tall drink.

He had to admit that he might have made the worst error a spy can make, to assume without observing, to take surface impressions for granted. He had seen her at Potter's side, but had he ever really looked at _her_? He had only ever seen her in his peripheral vision.

**

A week had passed since she had cast her first dark spell. More had followed. She was living a double life, playing Head Girl by day and then sneaking off down to the dungeons when night fell. She stared down at the book in front of her, realizing that she wasn't even seeing the words. Her double life didn't leave much time for sleeping. Raising her head, she looked across the library table at Harry and Ron, playfully arguing with each other like the teenagers they were, for the moment blissfully ignoring the seriousness of the world around them.

She watched them for a moment before interrupting.

"We should make our way down to the Great Hall, it's almost time for dinner."

Harry and Ron jumped to their feet, excited to take a break from their supposed studying.

As Hermione rose, a pile of papers came skittering out of her bag and spread onto the floor. Harry bent down to pick them up and her heart stopped as she realized what papers they were. She could hear her heart pounding in her chest as Harry stood up slowly from the other side of the table, eyes locked on the papers he held in his hand.

"What is this, Hermione?" he asked cautiously.

Her eyes flitted to Ron. Harry's penetrating gaze told her that he knew exactly what it was he was looking at.

"Just some notes I've been taking on some independent research I'm doing."

Harry raised his eyes from the page and looked at her intently.

_Don't get Ron involved with this_, she thought desperately.

"These notes look interesting," Harry said slowly, staring deeply into her eyes, "do you mind if I maybe borrow them later."

"I can go over them with you if you like."

"What are they?" Ron asked, not wanting to be left out. He took a step towards Harry and reached towards the papers that he held.

Harry quickly handed them back to Hermione before Ron could grab them.

"History of magic notes," Harry said quickly.

"Not you too," Ron rolled his eyes, "next thing you know, you'll be quoting _Hogwarts: A History_ just like her." He turned his back and started towards the door.

Harry opened his mouth to say something to Hermione.

"Later," she mumbled, and took off after Ron.

**

That night, she worked in Snape's office again. She had stayed later than normal, but she really wanted to avoid Harry and was hoping that if she stayed out late enough, he would be asleep by the time she returned. She knew that she needed to tell him what was happening, but a part of her was still unsure how he would react and wanted to avoid him as long as possible.

Snape worked in the adjoining lab as she read. She could hear the quiet clink of the stirring rod against the cauldron as he worked. It was soothing in a way. He had a steady rhythm that made her feel reassured even as she ventured into forbidden territory.

She heard the door of the lab open and a second voice in the adjoining room. It was the headmaster. She froze and the book slid out of her hand and onto the floor with a loud thud.

"Is there someone else here?" she heard the Headmaster ask Professor Snape in the other room. She winced.

"Miss Granger is working on her independent research project for Defense."

She quickly picked up the book from the floor and slid it under the sofa cushion. Scanning the bookshelves, she pulled out a harmless-sounding defense book at random and opened it as her heart thudded loudly in her chest as she resumed her seat.

A moment later, the friendly face of the Headmaster appeared in the doorway.

"Hello, Miss Granger. I didn't expect to find you here"

"Hello, Sir. Yes, I am working a bit late tonight, but I was in the middle of some very interesting reading and didn't want to stop."

"How is your research coming along?"

"Great," she forced a smile. "Professor Snape has been very helpful."

"Well, I will let you get back to your reading."

He shut the door behind him and she tiptoed over to listen to the voices on the other side as he now spoke to the professor.

"Severus, you know that I trust you, but I fear what others would think if they found out you had a female student alone with you down here after hours."

"And what is it that they would think, Albus?" There was no humor in his voice.

"I don't think that I need to tell you. You are aware that most teachers giving guidance on an independent study project have quick meeting with the student and the student does most of his or her research independently in the library."

"I am aware. However, Miss Granger's project requires the use of texts from my personal library...rare volumes that I am not inclined to let leave my office."

"The Hogwarts library is quite extensive, Severus, surely there is no need. What is the subject of her research project?"

"Shielding charms," he replied quickly.

"Then surely she can find what she needs in the library."

"Albus, don't you think that Miss Granger would have read every book in the library before she embarked on the project?"

She heard the door close and let out a breath she had been holding since she heard it open and crossed the room to seat herself back on the sofa. A moment later the door creaked open and Snape stood in the doorway.

He said nothing, simply stared at her across the space that divided them. She still held the book she had pulled from his shelf. What had started as a simple omission of the truth had now become a lie.

She had lied to the headmaster, to the head of the Order. She had broken from the man who she had believed in above all else since she was eleven years old. She had instead now put her faith in a dark man with a dubious past.

"I think it's time for you to get to bed, Miss Granger," he said finally.


	4. Lessons

Hermione had succeeded in staying out long enough to avoid Harry, but her luck could only last so long. The next night she sat studying in the common room with Harry and Ron when Ron finally yawned and announced he was going up to bed. She expected Harry to follow like he usually did, but Harry seemed to have other plans.

"I think I'm going to study for a little while longer," he told Ron, who shrugged and headed up the stairs. Harry waited until the footsteps had faded into silence.

He was watching her. Hermione could feel his penetrating green gaze on her but she refused to look up. Unable to read under the pressure, she concentrated intently on the word _Acromantula_ printed in black letters on the page before her. If she ignored him long enough maybe he would just forget about it and go to bed. Finally, Harry spoke.

"Hermione, we need to talk." His tone was both nervous and concerned.

She couldn't avoid this forever.

She sighed, closing her book and looking up at him, trying not to flinch as she met that green gaze.

"Fine. Talk."

"Hermione, those notes…" he faltered for a moment and then found the words. "Are you studying the Dark Arts?"

"I'm just doing some research," she snapped, unsure of how much to tell him.

"Where? Where are you getting that information? And don't tell me the library. I know that they don't have any books with information this detailed…with specific spellwork."

She hated herself, hated herself for what she was about to do, but he would never understand. He would never trust Severus Snape the way that she did. She had never lied to Harry before.

"I'm working on an independent study project for DADA and Snape leaves me alone in his office while I work. He has some books in there that I've been sneaking peeks into and copying down what I can."

It wasn't entirely a lie, but it wasn't quite the truth either.

She couldn't handle those piercing green eyes on her anymore.

"Harry, I know what you're thinking, but…"

"I want to join you."

"What?"

"This is my war. I can't let you do this on your own. How can we fight them if they have weapons that we don't have? I want to do this with you."

"Harry, this is dangerous, illegal." She said, suddenly second-guessing her original plan to share the information with him, to bring the golden child, Dumbledore's favorite, into this illicit scheme.

She stood to leave, but he caught her wrist.

"I know."

"Harry, you live in the spotlight. If anyone gets a hint of anything, it will be all over the front page of the Daily Prophet. The Ministry will use it as an excuse to condemn you. There are factions within the Ministry that have been waiting for years for an excuse to send you to Azkaban."

"Hermione, I know."

"If we get caught…"

"Hermione. We'll be alright. We always are." She hated that logic. It was what made him so reckless, but she couldn't argue with its verity thus far.

"Fine," she sighed, "I'll teach you what I know."

She paused to pick up her books.

"We can't let Ron know. He wouldn't understand."

"No," Harry replied, looking at her, "he wouldn't."

"And Ginny..." who was wary of anything resembling the Dark Arts since her second year.

"She wouldn't understand either," he finished for her.

x

x

Severus threw the scroll into the pile of the already-graded ones and unrolled the next one. He could feel by the weight of it that the author had exceeded the required minimum length. Picking up his red quill, he started to read. _Granger, of course. _The essay was perfect, better than perfect. She made connections that few defense experts would make, let alone students.

Did he really think he could manipulate her? The success of his plan depended on it, depended on his ability to manipulate and corrupt her mind.

She was intelligent; his best strategy was to build logical arguments to convince her of the merits of this path of study. It wasn't that she hadn't been told of the dangers. She had been told the other side as well, by the Ministry, by her friends, by the newspapers. But in a world where the newspapers lied, the Ministry did whatever it could to cover its own ass and she had friends like Luna Lovegood with her ridiculous beliefs, surely it would not be impossible to convince the girl to make a distinction between fact and fiction according to the lines he drew for her.

His eyes drifted down to her essay again.

She could have been so much, if she had been born in a different time, if she had chosen different friends. She had so much potential and he was out to destroy it all.

But it wasn't about her. She was merely a pawn. It was about Lily. He closed his eyes and let himself remember her smile, the way her red hair moved in the wind. Lily had had potential too and it had been obliterated in a split second. Only by keeping her son alive could he make her death mean anything. When he had sworn to her that he would protect the life of her son, he had never imagined that it would come to this. But then again, he had believed that Dumbledore's ultimate goal was the keep the boy alive too. It had been a bitter shock when he found out that he had been wrong.

His only loyalty was to the memory of Lily and if those goals coincided with the Dark Lord's, that did nothing but make his life easier. If Hermione Granger was to be a casualty to this mission then so be it. She was a tool, he reminded himself, nothing more. She was merely a necessary pathway to his ultimate goal.

The next part would be easy. She would pass on her knowledge to Potter. The boy was waiting for it. It was like setting a match to dry grass.

x

x

Hermione paced back and forth as Harry sat on a desk watching her. The classroom they occupied was an unused one they had stumbled upon, heavily warded against eavesdroppers and intruders.

"We're just going to start off with the theory before you cast any spells," Hermione told him. Harry looked somewhat disappointed but nodded.

She shuffled through her notes until she found the right ones.

"There are five main categories of dark potions..."

Usually when she started lecturing, Harry's eyes glazed over, but this time they held hers in rapt attention.

An hour later, Severus watched from the shadows as his two students exited the vacant classroom. Everything was going according to plan. He had meant what he had told the Dark Lord about the curious woman as responsible for the fall of man. Potter was no different. He would trust her in anything. But this time, she was unknowingly leading him into a trap.

He felt a burning sensation in his left arm and headed to his quarters to gather his things, pleased that he would have progress to report. It was easier this way, really. Working against the Dark Lord had been a dangerous business and he felt less trepidation leaving for these meetings now that he had once again found himself on the Dark Lord's side. It was the meetings with Dumbledore that he had started to dread, having to carefully conceal the information that would get him killed.

x

x

Ten. It was ten o'clock.

Hermione glanced nervously around the room. Snape wasn't always in his office when she arrived, but he usually showed up within the half hour. She had been here for three hours and still she had seen not a glimpse of him. She cracked the door and peered into the empty lab again...just to make sure.

It wasn't like him not to show up and she couldn't help the sinking feeling that something was wrong...that something had happened.

When she heard movement in the other room, she had to restrain herself from bursting through the door and asking if he was alright. She forced herself to keep reading, or at the very least to keep staring at the page. Then suddenly there was a loud clattering in the adjoining room and she could restrain herself no longer. She pushed the door open and stood in the doorway, taking in the sight of the man sprawled against the tabletop surrounded by broken vials.

"Sir?" she asked cautiously, moving towards him.

He didn't move.

"Professor?" she tried again, nearing him.

His hand spasmed and she saw something silver fall to the floor with a soft thud. Rounding the table, she saw that it was a Death Eater mask and her heart seemed to sink into her chest. But still he had made no indication that he had heard her.

She took a deep breath.

"Severus?"

His head whipped up suddenly, his eyes glazed and panicked. He tried to stand up but his body merely slid off the slick table surface as he crumpled to the floor. She rushed towards him, getting down on her hands and knees to crawl under the table where the upper half of his body now lay.

She should do something. She should go for help. But who would she go to? It was well past ten and she was alone with the professor in his quarters. He headmaster had already made insinuations and to top it off she still had dark arts books spread across the table in his office. She glanced down at the form of the man before her. His forehead was damp and his breathing was quick and shallow. He could lose his job, they could both be sent to Azkaban, but it was better than letting him die...wasn't it?

His eyes suddenly shot open and he looked at her with what could only be labeled confusion. It wasn't a look she was used to seeing on his face.

"What do I do?" She whispered, on her hands and knees like a scared child.

His eyes slid shut again.

"Top shelf, dark green potion. Third shelf, second from left, yellow." The last word dissolved into a groan of pain.

She crawled out from under the table and grabbed the potions from the shelves, ducking back under the table with the specified vials in hand.

"Sir?" she asked hesitantly. "Do you think...could you open your mouth?"

He didn't move and for a moment she thought he might have passed out, but then his lips parted slightly and she emptied the vials down his throat.

She sat back on her heels again and waited, watching his face intently for any little sign of life. She had not noticed before that he was bleeding, but blood had started to pool on the dusty stone floor underneath his shoulder. She wanted to search for the wound, but was hesitant to touch him, was hesitant even to breathe. If she knew one thing about the Professor, it was that he would not appreciate her molesting his person while he lay unconscious on the floor.

--

Severus opened his eyes and for a split-second panicked at the unfamiliar surroundings before he realized that the wood surface he was staring at was the underside of one of the tables in his lab.

"Fuck," he groaned, twisting his head to the side and looking up into the startled eyes of Hermione Granger.

What was she doing here? It had to be well past curfew. Hadn't she given up when he hadn't shown up for her lesson? Shouldn't she be in bed? Why was she here?

He closed his eyes again.

Great. Just great. He had tried to keep the Dark Arts abstract for her, tried to get her to see them simply as an intellectual exercise. He had kept her splitting open pillows and mutilating vegetables, had tried to keep these visions of blood and torn flesh from her mind.

And now he had to go and ruin it all. He had to stumble in here soaked in blood and barely able to walk, had to show her just what lay at the end of the road he had her headed down. She would not follow him now. She would have to be crazy to keep going after this.

He rolled over onto his stomach, letting out a low groan as his shoulder made contact with the floor. It served him right for ever re-sheathing his wand before Bella had left the room. Crazy witch. Pulling himself out from under the table, he shakily rose to his feet.

He dragged himself across the room, leaving bloody footprints in the wake of his limp. What was she still doing here? Why did she have to be here to see this? Why couldn't he have been allowed to pass out of the cold floor of his laboratory alone. He could have dragged himself off of the floor the next morning with a sore back but no permanent damage done just like he always did. What did she want from him?

Severus paused in the doorway of his office to lean against the frame, trying to pull himself together enough to cross the room. Taking a deep breath, he continued on, each step more painful than the last. Passing through his office, he pushed open the door on the opposite wall, stumbling through into his bedroom. As he crossed through the darkened room, he was vaguely aware that the girl was still following him. What did she think she was doing? She had always shown respect for him, always called him 'Sir' and now she was invading his privacy in the most offensive way. She was following him into his private quarters. Didn't she know this was against the rules?

Making his way through the dark room on memory, he pushed open yet another door and finally let himself collapse onto the edge of the tub. The exertion had strained him in his weakened state and he struggled to catch his breath. All the wanted to do was sleep, to lose himself to the sweet oblivion. But his shoulder...he had to deal with his shoulder first he was reminded be the moisture trickling down his side.

He shrugged off his outer robe and let it fall into the tub. It would need to be washed and repaired anyway. The blood had soaked through his white collared shirt from his collarbone to halfway down his side. His fingers shook and he took one button at a time, slowly slipping it out of its slot. Once his shirt was loosened, he let the fabric fall away from his injury.

The wound fell across a series of old scars. It was deeper than he had suspected. 'Great,' he thought, 'this one will leave a mark too.'

He raised his head and was startled to find that he was not alone. Sometime during the examination of his injuries he had forgotten that she was still here. _Why_ was she still here?

She had lit the torches and was standing in the middle of the room with a bowl of water she had no doubt conjured and a wash rag. She took a step toward him with the dampened rag in her outstretched hand.

"No."

She looked up, startled as he pulled the bowl from her grasp and started to clean the wound himself. She opened the cabinet and returned a moment later with a handful of dittany. She knelt in front of him and offered him the dittany in her outstretched hand. He finished cleaning the wound took it from her silently. He applied it as she watched. Why was she still here? Why was she watching him? Why couldn't she just leave him to heal himself in peace, alone as he always did.

But she knelt there, studying him. He felt like an animal in a zoo. He just wanted her to leave.

He finished with the dittany and though the wound had finally stopped bleeding, it was still red and angry-looking. Her eyes were fixed on the dark gash on his pale shoulder. With his good arm, he pinched the bridge of his nose as he let his eyes slip closed. He just wanted to be alone.

"Get out," he said without looking up.

"What?"

He raised his head.

"Leave."

"Is there something I can do? Is there a spell that..."

"Miss Granger," he snapped, "despite your childish beliefs, Magic cannot fix everything."

Her eyes dropped to the floor and she was silent for a long moment.

Great. Just great. He had yelled at her. Now she _would_ leave, leave and never come back. He had frightened her away and she would run away and cry like the scared little girl that she was and all of his planning, all of his preparation would be for _nothing._

Finally she looked back up at him and he was surprised at the raw pain he saw in her eyes.

"Do you think I don't know that?" She said slowly. "Dolohov taught me that lesson at the Department of Mysteries." Her fingers slipped open the top few buttons of her blouse to reveal a thin, pale scar that dipped out of view. He had forgotten that she had been injured at the Department of Mysteries, had never known the exact curse or the extent of the damage. His eyes drifted from her scar back up to her face.

"Why do you think I'm so determined to do this? Why do you think I want to learn these thing you have to teach me so badly? I've gone up against wizards way out of my league and I won't….I won't do it again. I have never…never felt pain like that. They won't be scared of us if we only ever play defense." She paused to take a breath, "We can't win anything with shielding spells."

He stared at her speechless, feeling as if he had underestimated her yet again. She was not a scared little girl, his eyes drifted to the scar of her breast. She was a woman who had already seen too much. He looked back up into her eyes as she continued to kneel on the floor before him, finding only a quiet resolve there. He had tried to lure her into the Dark Arts as an intellectual pursuit, but she was not interested in theory. For all the time she spent with her nose buried in a book, she was a practical girl, interested in knowledge she could use.

She raised herself slowly from the floor and left without a word. He leaned his head against the cool tile wall, letting it support the weight that he had neither the strength nor the energy to bear.

xx

xx

_A/N: I know it's been a while. It would make me very happy is you would please review this chapter.  
_


	5. Suspicion

Ron had been talking about Quidditch for nearly an hour. Or maybe it just felt that way.

Hermione smiled at him and nodded at the appropriate times, her mind somewhere else entirely. She wasn't sure where she had gotten the courage to follow the Potion's Master into his private quarters the other night except that he was obviously in need of some assistance. She had known in the back of her mind, of course, that he was in danger every time he was summoned, but she had never seen it for herself. She was overwhelmed by his bravery, by his sacrifice.

Her eyes roamed across the room as Ron related to her the latest Chudley Cannons game in play-by-play detail. It was just the two of them in the Hog's Head Tavern. Did he think this was a date? Is this how he thought he was going to win her over?

Plump pumpkins lined the bar. The place had been decorated for Halloween, although sometimes Hermione had trouble distinguishing Halloween decorations from the normal look of many wizarding establishments.

Discretely hiding another yawn, she gave a well-timed nod towards Ron. Hermione was quite simply exhausted. Between her normal schoolwork, her Head Girl duties, her extra lessons with Snape and her tutoring of Harry, she was left with very little time to sleep. At times it felt as though she was not only leading a double-life, but a triple one as well. She knew that she was pushing herself too hard, but there seemed to be no other choice. She made it through most days by looking forward to the hours she would spend in Snape's office, devouring new knowledge. Everything else seemed simply to fill the hours between one lesson and the next.

A movement from out the widow caught her eye and she glanced past Ron and out the dirty glass to see a familiar shape slipping off between two buildings. This wasn't good.

She stood suddenly, startling Ron enough for him to stop talking.

"I just remembered…I have a some errands to do."

"Oh," he said suddenly, moving to stand, "I can…"

"I'll just see you back at Hogwarts." She was already halfway to the door.

She hurried down the alley between the buildings, coming out behind them on the edge of the forest just in time to see the figure disappear behind the trees.

"Harry," she called, running to catch up with him.

She entered the forest just as he raised his wand to a familiar position, getting ready to apparate.

"Harry, you can't go off alone." Especially not today.

"Mind your own business," he snapped at her.

She could see the determination in his face and as he started to apparate, she reached out and grabbed his arm.

A second later, they appeared in a field with a soft pop. Turning, she took in her surroundings. In the distance there was a small town, a mix of muggle and magical from what she could tell. A few yards from where they stood there was a gate that enclosed a small cemetery with a decaying stone church on the far side. She had but one guess as to which cemetery this was.

Her eyes snapped back to Harry who had taken a step backwards after the apparition and was now glaring at her.

"It is against school rules to leave Hogsmeade during Hogsmeade weekends."

"I know that."

She glanced around her.

"You shouldn't be here, Harry. This is dangerous. You can't just go running off alone."

"I've never been here, Hermione. My parents were murdered sixteen years ago and I've never even seen their graves."

She sighed.

"I'll stay right here and watch for danger. You can do whatever you need to do. You won't even know I'm here."

He turned and strode towards the cemetery, hesitating as he opened the gate. Finally, he called back to her, "Are you coming?"

It took her a moment to realize what he meant and she hurried to catch up to him.

They found the gravestones easily. Weeds grew around James Potter's grave marker, almost covering it entirely, while Lily's had been picked free of debris.

She kept a few paces away from where Harry stood with his head bowed, close enough to give him support but far enough to leave him to his thoughts. Her eyes scanned the horizon for any sign of a threat, but she found none. It was dangerous for them to be there unaccompanied, out in the open in the middle of the day.

The sound of Harry's voice breaking the silence startled her.

"What would they think?"

"Who?" she asked, suddenly realizing that he was looking at her expectantly.

"My parents. What would they think of what I'm doing?"

So that was what this was about, his study of the Dark Arts. His parents, after all, were both aurors.

She looked at him carefully.

"I'm sure under normal circumstances your parents wouldn't have wanted you learning the Dark Arts, but these are not normal circumstances. We're in a war. I think they would be happy that you're not making the same mistakes they did. When Voldemort came for them…they were unprepared. They did everything they could to try to protect you. You're just learning new spells, new weapons that they didn't have."

He was silent again for a few minutes.

"They were friends."

"Who?"

"Snape and my mother, they were friends."

"Really?"

"I found out in 5th year, while he was trying to teach me Occulmancy."

Whatever thread of though this information fit into, he did not share it with her.

"They were friends when they were younger…before he turned evil."

It was an improvement, she though, that Harry no longer seemed to believe that Snape had been evil from birth.

"This isn't Snape's fault, Harry."

"I know. It's Voldemort's. Voldemort killed my parents."

There was another long silence.

"I'm going to kill him, Hermione. And people can say that it was my destiny, or that I did it to save everyone…but I'm going to do it for revenge."

The sun was starting to settle low in the sky.

"We should get back to Hogsmeade, Harry, before anyone finds out we're gone."

He followed her back through the gate, the dry leaves crunching under their feet.

"There's something you should know," he said quietly as they neared the point where they had apparated. "The Headmaster is going to start taking me on trips away from the school at nights sometimes…to find…some things we need to find. I'm not supposed to say anything to anyone," his voice was but a whisper now. "I just thought you should know."

"Can you tell me any more than that?" she asked, her curiosity peaked.

He shook his head and they apparated.

x

x

From the moment the headmaster had uttered those fateful words, Severus had been walking around as if in a dream. Dumbledore had calmly informed him that after all this time, the boy had been saved for nothing more than a sacrifice, to be thrown into the flames at the appropriate time. And he had expected blind obedience from his spy, had expected that after years of risking his life to protect the boy, his spy would simply follow orders that meant the boy's death. He apparently thought that Severus' loyalty was to him, or to the cause. He had been wrong. It had been Lily who Severus had betrayed, Lily who was dead. Everything else had simply been a convenient alliance. He stood with the Dark Lord now, silently switching sides yet again. He cared nothing for ideology or morality; this was personal and it always had been.

His eyes drifted to the young woman across the room, bent over a cauldron. She was the necessary sacrifice.

Hermione fastened her hair up with one hand as she slowly stirred the concoction with the other. This potions required continuous stirring while it simmered for several hours and she had already abandoned her outer robes to the heat long ago. The thin white blouse she now wore clung to her and had become nearly transparent in the steam and his mind kept beginning to wander as his eyes roamed from her flushed face down to....no, she was a student and he shouldn't think of that.

He had been startled at her behavior the other night, following him back into his private quarters. He had been shocked when she had not shied away from the blood and his temper, but had shown him her own scar, had let him know that she was not afraid. That lack of fear would be her downfall.

They had been talking on and off as she worked on her potion. He had to admit that she was not as annoying as he had previously thought. She lifted her wand and bent over her notes to review the spell before she cast it. Dark Potions often required certain spells to be woven in to the brewing process.

Finally she finished and transferred some of the potion to the vial. He walked over and stood by her desk, lifting the corked vial towards the light and tilting it on its side and letting the potion move so that he could examine the consistency. It was a Dark potion, meant to cause gruesome bleeding in the drinker. It was light blue in color and had a consistency like molasses. He removed the cork and took a quick sniff, noting the correct scent of damp leaves.

He set the vial down and then looked at her, narrowing his eyes.

"This potion is perfect," he said with an accusing tone. This was a girl who had never shown any special talent for potions, who had always managed to pull off something that might seem flawless at first glance, but that contained many small imperfections under closer examination. This was an extremely difficult potion and she had brewed it impeccably.

"Yes," she replied, unable to hide the small smile that involuntarily crept onto her face at the praise. He had always marked her potions as average at best.

"But you never brew perfect potions…even for ones much simpler than this."

"Don't you notice anything that might be different?"

His eyes fell on the empty room behind her.

"I spend part of my time in Potion's class trying to make sure that Neville doesn't blow himself up, another part trying to make sure that Harry and Ron don't get in trouble, an eye on Malfoy at all times to make sure he doesn't slip anything into my cauldron, and part of my mind tuning out the things that Pansy and the other girls are whispering behind my back. I may seem disappointed when you mark my assignments as anything less than perfect…but I'm never surprised."

"I just always thought that you had no real talent for potions."

"I can never concentrate."

He picked up the vial and held it to the light once again.

"You are an exceptional witch."

He was surprised at how easily the compliment slipped out. It made sense, of course, to pay her compliments, to encourage her in these studies. When Lucius had begun to guide him down the path to darkness, his flattery had known no bounds. After a lifetime of being criticized and made fun of, Severus had had someone telling him how intelligent, how talented he was for the first time. It had worked. Lucius had promised him power, knowledge, fame, wealth, glory and had told him nothing of the consequences.

Years ago, after he had seen the true face of the darkness, he had promised himself that it would end with him, that he would lure no one else to the dark the way that he had been lured. He was now breaking that vow.

But he had also vowed his loyalty to the Dark Lord and then spied against him. He had vowed his loyalty to Dumbledore and then worked to corrupt his most precious weapon. His word was not worth much. There was only one vow he had never broken, that he would never break…Lily.

x

x

Hermione quickly replaced the thick book of the shelf and stepped out of the restricted section. She needed to complete her rounds so she could have some time to get a little more studying in before bed.

A familiar voice stopped her as she stepped between the stacks.

"Miss Granger."

She looked up to see the woman who had always been her favorite teacher.

"Hello, Professor."

"And what, may I ask, are you doing in the restricted section?"

"I'm Head Girl. I'm allowed."

McGonagall studied her for a moment.

"Why don't you come to my office and have some tea?" Her tone left no room for a polite refusal so Hermione followed the older woman out of the library and into her office. Once they had been seated and tea had been served, the older woman continued.

"I have seen you exiting the Restricted Section quite a few times recently."

Damn, she would have to be more careful.

"It was my understanding, Professor, that as Head Girl, I was allowed to access books that might be off limits for some of the younger students."

"Of course it is allowed. The intention was to provide reference materials to some of the older, more trustworthy students that might be useful to their studies. However, much of this material is dangerous. It was intended to be used as a resource of last resort, to be used sparingly and only when absolutely necessary. It was not meant to be used as your primary reading material."

"What are you…"

"I'm concerned about you, Hermione."

She remained motionless for a moment, her tea cup in mid air. Slowly, she lowered it as set it back on the platter with a soft clink.

"Professor, I appreciate your concern, but I really haven't run into anything that was harmful or dangerous."

"Sometimes, that is not for you to judge."

She opened her mouth to speak, but the older woman continued.

"I know you're an intelligent girl, Miss Granger, some even say the brightest of your generation, but sometimes even the most intelligent get into waters that are too deep for them."

"I appreciate the concern Professor, but I assure you that I have not run into anything that I cannot handle."

The older woman studied her intently for a moment and Hermione tried not to fidget under the scrutiny.

"You have always been my favorite student, Hermione. Maybe that's why I've noticed the changes. You don't raise your hand in class as much anymore. Your essays are still magnificent, but recently they've seemed rushed. You have dark circles under your eyes. It would suggest that you were involved in something…"

"The Head Girl duties are just a little more than I had anticipated. And with Voldemort still out there, I haven't been sleeping well. I do appreciate your concern, Professor, but it's nothing that I can't handle."

McGonagall pursed her lips and stood.

"Well, I won't keep you any longer. I just want...I just want you to be careful."

"Of course."

Hermione stepped out of the office and made her way towards Gryffindor Tower. She would have to be more careful.

She would simply have to guard her secret more closely.

* * *

_A/N: Thanks for reading! And thank you to everyone who has left reviews so far.  
_


	6. A Step Towards the Darkness

"Don't tell me you've never seen the similarities."

"I don't know what you mean, Minerva."

"You know exactly what I mean."

"But…Hermione Granger?"

"Albus, Do I need to remind you of all people that Tom Riddle was Head Boy?"

"No, of course not. But I hardly think that…"

"In her fifth year, she invented a spell to call her followers to her for the DA meetings. Does that sound like anyone else to you?"

A long silence followed her statement.

"I hardly think it's the same thing."

"No one ever does. Not until it's too late."

He regarded her silently for a moment.

"Severus is supervising her independent study project. I will ask him to keep an eye on her. Of anyone, he will know what to watch for."

"Thank you."

x

x

Hogsmeade weekend had come again already. Where was this school year going?

Hermione would rather have been back at the school getting in some extra reading, but McGonagall had been keeping a close eye on her ever since their talk and she didn't want to do anything that would raise suspicions. So she had acted like an excited teenager to get out for a few hours when all she really wanted to do was hole herself away in the dungeons with some illegal books. What was wrong with her? She thought about those books more than she knew was healthy or normal. Part of the reason she had gotten out today was to get herself away from them for a little bit, to get some fresh air and convince herself that she didn't need them.

It was drizzling slightly and her shoes slipped on the shiny cobblestones, causing her to slide into a stone shop. She caught herself on the wall before she ended up on the ground.

Suddenly something grabbed the collar of her robes and yanked her into an alley. Her heart caught in her chest as she stared directly into the silver face of a mask, but a hand was firmly pressed over her mouth before she could scream. It was a long alley, a space only large enough for perhaps three people standing side-by side that snaked jaggedly between the closely-built domiciles of Hogsmeade. The narrowness prevented the light from penetrating more than the first fifteen feet or so of the passage. And now she was being held here…by a Death Eater.

"Miss Granger," she heard a familiar voice say and relaxed slightly in her captor's grasp. What was he doing _here_ dressed like_ that_?

"An attack on Hogsmead is imminent. I need you to run as fast as you can back to the school without anyone noticing and inform the Headmaster. Can you do this?"  
She nodded her head as his palm was still covering her mouth.

He released her suddenly and stepped back.

"Go." He commanded.

She turned to run but her progress was impeded by a second figure stepping out of the shadows.

"So, Severus," the man sneered, pulling off his mask to reveal a scarred face and wild dark hair, "You have finally been caught betraying the Dark Lord."

"Rastaban, I was merely…"

"I know what you were doing. Do you forget that I was standing right beside you when our Lord made it clear that no one was to know of the attack."

"And what have we here?" The man leered at her and she insintively took a step back and then another, edging her way in the narrow alley away from this man and towards the safety of her professor. She dared not turn her back on the Death Eater, so she could not see her professor, but moved slowly backwards, blindly seeking his protection.

He licked his lips and raised his wand as she stood frozen in his gaze. She braced herself for the unknown spell that she knew was coming for her, but before it made impact she was thrown out of the way, landing on her knees on the sharp cobblestones.

She saw nothing but the black of his robes as he stepped in front of her, firing off shot after shot. She pulled herself back up to her feet as the two men dueled. Severus was in the worse position and was cornered as the alleyway narrowed, giving him less space to maneuver than his opponent.

Rabastan suddenly switched his focus for a split second, turning his wand instead towards Hermione. As Severus turned to block the spell he expected to be fired at her, the other man turned his wand back and struck Severus' now vulnerable position.

He fell to the ground with a cry of pain, his wand flying out of his grasp and rolling over the uneven cobblestones until it disappeared into the shadows.

The man advanced on him and pulled him up by the collar, shoving him against the dirty stone wall. There was a wild glee in his eyes.

"It's over, Snape. The Dark Lord will see you for the traitor you are."

"Stop," she shouted and cast a stunning spell, but the man laughed and repelled it, activating a shielding spell around himself and his new prisoner. As he laughed, she could see the crooked yellow teeth in his mouth. Hermione continued to cast spells at the man, but the shield seemed to be designed to repel all but the most serious spells. Her wand shook in her trembling hand.

"Please stop."

But the Death Eater ignored her, grabbing Snape's body and raising his wand in preparation to apparate. She couldn't let him leave. She couldn't let him take the professor with him. Her instincts took over.

She could taste the word as she spoke it.

"_Imperio_"

It was as if a storm raged around her, but she stood in the quiet center, focused on nothing but the masked man before her. A darkness invaded the corners of her vision, obscuring everything but him.

She took a step towards him, no longer afraid, but emboldened by the power she felt flow through her. The man stared at her with glassy, emotionless eyes and she felt a rush at the fact that this powerful Death Eater was now completely under her control.

She stepped closer, raising her wand until it rested against his cheek and she used it to turn his face until he was looking at her.

"Release him," she commanded in a low voice that she barely recognized as her own.

The professor was instantly let go. He steadied himself against the wall, but did not intervene.

"Put your wand away," she told the man and he complied, slipping his wand away into the folds of his robes.

It was unlike anything she had ever felt, this complete control over another human being, over a Death Eater. She had spent the latter part of her childhood terrified of these dark robes and pale masks and now she had one of these men under her complete control. She had hidden from them, she had run from them, and every time, she had been petrified with fear. But now, now she was not afraid.

She stared into the man's lifeless eyes, flooded by the knowledge that he would do anything…_anything_ that she told him to do. She could make him kill his brother, kill his wife, kill himself and he could do nothing…nothing to stop her. She could control his actions, his mind, his life.

"You will remember nothing of this, neither what you saw nor what you heard. You have no proof that Professor Snape is anything but loyal to your cause. You will tell your master that there were too many aurors in Hogsmeade and that the attack needed to be cancelled. Leave. Now."

And as commanded, he apparated, and her spell was released.

Her hand trembled, barely able to maintain its grip on her wand. Her knees felt like they were about to buckle and she was dizzy with nausea.

She was barely aware of the professor pulling her to him and taking her back to the castle.

x

x

Hermione opened her eyes to find herself on the sofa of Professor Snape's office. Only a few of the lights were lit, leaving the office bathed in a soft dimness. She blinked a few times as she adjusted to her surroundings. The professor was sitting in a chair beside her with a damp washcloth on her forehead. She pushed his hand off of her and frantically sat up.

"Do you remember what happened?" he asked cautiously.

"I…" she stared down at her hands. "I cast an unforgivable curse."

When she looked back up at him, he could see the accusation in her eyes.

"This…this is wrong." She gestured to the place on his bookshelves where the current Dark texts he had assigned her sat. A hint of blind panic crept into her expression. "We shouldn't be doing this. Why…why have you been teaching me this?"

She was hysterical. He stood and simply stared at her.

"I thought you trusted me."

She shook her head slowly, lowering her face into her hands.

"I…I do…I'm not sure."

She had gone too far and it had scared her. He could see that, could see as plainly as day that if he did not find a way to pull her back in now, that he would lose her.

Severus pulled up his sleeve to reveal the place where Rabastan's spell had made contact. The flesh was blistered. Sitting back down in the austere wooden chair, he leaned in towards her, thrusting his injury into her field of view.

"This. This is what you're fighting. Did you think you can combat it with the jelley-legs jinx? How were the other spells working for you? You did what you needed to do."

He lifted his head and a long piece of dark hair fell away from his eye, revealing the dark orb of his iris that glinted in the low candlelight as he looked at her intently.

"No amount of studying, no amount of preparation will help you if you're playing by different rules."

She shook her head.

"These spells are illegal, they're dangerous. The Ministry outlawed them for a reason."

"The Ministry?" he spat at her, standing suddenly, "surely you don't believe the idiots at the Ministry to be the best judge of magic. The same Ministry that denied the return of Voldemort even when all evidence pointed to the contrary?" He started to pace back and forth across the small room as he raged. "The Ministry that dragged Potter in for a full hearing for a simple case of underage magic? The Ministry that acts out of fear and rumors? That sways in the wind with public opinion or bribery, whichever happen to be stronger at the moment? The Ministry that rarely shows a shred of competence or judgment? Is this the Ministry that you believe has thoroughly analyzed all the data and sorted through which spells should be outlawed and which should not? "

"I…."

"Do you want to know_ why_ the Dark Arts were outlawed, Miss Granger?"

"Yes." _Of course she did, when had she ever turned down knowledge?_

He sat down in the chair again, close to her, and his voice dropped to a velvety whisper.

"Because not everyone can handle them. You've felt the rush of magic in your bloodstream, do you think that Mr. Longbottom could handle that? Do you think Mr. Goyle could? It breaks some, it corrupts others. Instead of taking the time to sort out the inept from the truly worthy, the Ministry simply outlawed the magic for everyone."

He studied her face in the dim candlelight, the way her soft curls fell.

"Look at me, Miss Granger."

She raised her head slowly and looked at him with hesitant eyes.

"I have been practicing the Dark Arts for longer than you have been alive. Do I seem incurably insane to you?"

She shook her head.

"Am I a bad man?"

She shook her head again. _Wrong answer,_ he thought to himself, _I am a bad man. The worst._

"Not everyone can handle the power, Miss Granger. Some wizards crumble under the force, others let it sweep them away like a dark tide. But there are some," he paused and reached out his hand, fingering one of the soft curls that framed her face, "there are some who are born for it."

She seemed to be holding her breath. He dropped her curl and leaned back in his chair, his eyes never leaving hers.

"Are you content to stop your journey into magic now, when you have barely scratched the surface?"

"No," there was that fire in her voice again, the spark that refused to be pressed down, that refused to be restrained. Her eyes were alive with excitement as the torchlight reflected off their shiny surfaces.

"I'm not saying it isn't dangerous, Hermione. Teaching you these things could land us both in Azkaban. It's a risk."

She leaned forward and he saw that for all her lecturing and planning and worrying and nagging, this was a girl who liked a little danger. Interesting.

"I'm not afraid to break a few rules," she whispered with a coy smile.

He left her on the sofa to recover and sat in his bedroom alone until the torches burnt out, sat by himself after that in the darkened room. He had lied to her, had used himself as an example of how to walk through the dark unscathed even as his soul lay in a million pieces.

He was leading her down a dark tunnel of which there was no way out.

She had saved his life. He was not unaware of that fact. She had saved his life with the very same knowledge he was using to destroy her. The irony was not lost of him.

He opened the door to find her sitting up, staring at her hands.

"I feel different," she whispered.

_Of course you do, you just made the first tear into your soul._

"You're just shaken up," he told her.

She nodded her head and rose to leave.

The first unforgivable, it was said in circles that he had traveled in, told you all you needed to know about the witch or wizard in question. Her first unforgivable had been the Imperious, of course. He could imagine nothing else from the bossy little control freak.

It was said that the Cruciatus was cast by those who liked to inflict pain. It had, of course, been Bella's first.

His had been the Avada Kedavara. He had jumped right into the deep end, only to discover it was not water but quicksand and it had quickly pulled him under.


	7. Torn and Untorn

Chapter 7: Torn and Untorn

She remembered the first time she had ever seen an unforgivable cast. The spider dangling on the edge of the glass under Moody's, well, Crouch's spell. She had felt a sense of horror then, a sick feeling in her stomach. Why did she not feel that now?

Hermione stared at herself in the mirror, moving her hand forward to touch the smooth glassy surface. She felt different, something was different, yet she could see no visible changes. Something had happened when she had cast the unforgivable curse. But the Professor had dismissed the feeling, had implied that it was all in her mind. And surely, of anyone, he would certainly know.

She had known this was a war, of course, had even expected that there were certain lines that would need to be crossed in order to win; she had just never expected that she would be one of the people to cross them. Since she had first learned of the unforgivable curses, she had put them in a category in her mind with activities such as cheating on a test or robbing a bank, things she would never do. And now she had cast one, had done it willfully and purposefully. She couldn't say that she hadn't really meant to because she had. In that moment she had wanted nothing more than to control that man, to bend him to her will.

What did that say about her? Even Harry, in all his pain and rage from Sirius' death, hadn't wanted to hurt Bellatrix Lestrange quite enough to actually do it. What did that mean about _her_? She reached out her other hand to touch the cold surface of the mirror, holding eye contact with her reflected self. What was happening to her?

She had been warned of course, of the dangers of casting an unforgivable. Mrs. Weasley had told them that casting an unforgivable spell could damage one's soul. But that was just superstition, wasn't it? Like how garden gnomes could give children bad dreams if they stepped on them or how listening to the wizarding wireless too long could make your ears turn into toadstools. Just old wives tales.

Her parents were scientists. They had explained how her body worked in detail that would have bored most children. They had explained everything from cells to neural synapses. She had never given much thought to the idea of a soul. Even in the wizarding world, she had viewed all this talk about souls as an abstraction, a superstition, equivalent to muggle religion. That's what it was...wasn't it? If it was true, Snape would certainly know. He would have warned her if there was any real danger. She was lying to Harry, to McGonnagal, to the Headmaster. She was putting all her faith in one man. There was no choice but to trust him.

The sudden realization that there was someone else in the room snapped her quickly out of her thoughts. She spun, pulling out her wand in the process, to see Harry standing in her doorway in his full quidditich gear.

He eyed her wand with a look of surprise.

"I'm sorry. You startled me," she admitted, quickly putting her wand away, embarrassed of having just pulled it on her best friend.

"Don't you have practice?" she asked, quick to change the subject.

He grinned and plopped down on her bed, letting his hand slide under the mattress to the spot where she kept her notes.

"I told them I wasn't feeling well."

She gave him a strange look.

"Harry Potter is skipping practice to _study_?"

He answered her with a smile and she took her place on the bed beside him as he shrugged off his pads and opened the notebook.

Out of the corner of her eye she watched him read through her notes, suddenly feeling guilty for her betrayal. Harry knew she was studying the Dark Arts, but not that it was Professor Snape that was giving her the knowledge. He would never agree to this if he knew.

Never.

x

x

She had been distracted, preoccupied all week. He should know, he had been watching her carefully. Too carefully. Much more carefully than was appropriate.

He tore his gaze from her slender form and focused back down on the essays he was supposed to be grading.

_Second Year Defense, essay on the basic characteristics of vampires._

There had been a distance before, a distance he was now struggling to maintain. She had been innocent before…pure. The fact that she had cast an unforgivable curse attracted him in a way he wasn't entirely sure was healthy. But she was like him now…tainted….torn. She was no longer unreachable. If she was willing to cast an unforgivable, maybe there were other lines she was willing to cross…his mind wandered… He hadn't expected to find such a perverse satisfaction in his ability to corrupt the Head Girl. Every time he looked at her he was torn between consuming guilt and intense attraction.

_She is a child,_ he reminded himself. No matter the adult circumstances that had been thrust upon her, she was still a child.

He corralled his thoughts for a moment, focused on Lily. Dear, sweet Lily.

The girl was nothing but a tool, a means to an end. She was nothing, _nothing_ compared to Lily. Perfect, flawless Lily.

_Then why was this guilt eating him alive?_

He looked up to see that the girl had gone, had slipped silently from the room without his notice.

The door had been shut before and it now rested slightly ajar. He stared at the bare wooden surface, lost in his thoughts. A face peeked around the corner and he groaned internally.

"Severus, my boy, may I come in for a moment?"

"Of course, Albus."

The old man entered his office, wandering along the walls in a seemingly casual perusal of his book collection.

"How have your classes been going recently, Severus?" he asked mildly.

"Fine. Same as always."

"And how is Miss Granger's project coming along?"

"As expected."

The Headmaster paused and turned to face him.

"She is an exemplary student," Severus added under the headmaster's keen gaze.

The old man stood in silence for a moment, then continued his seeming perusal of the bookshelves. Severus knew better.

"I'm sure you remember our last discussion concerning your activities with Miss Granger."

"Of course."

"I saw her leaving on my way down here. It's rather late for her to be down here alone. I still have concerns. What people may think…"

A short laugh came out of his throat. It was not a sound that very many people had heard.

"I am the last person that people would ever….when she could have Potter?"

_As if he didn't want to, as if the thought had never crossed his mind. It had._

"The girl spends countless hours with Witches Weekly's most desired bachelor and you are worried that people might get the impression that it's_ me_ that she wants?"

_As if he had never imagined it, never fantasized. He had._

_As if the image of her smooth thighs didn't increasingly dominate his dreams. They did._

_The Headmaster would fire him immediately if he saw even the faintest glimmer of the depravity of his thoughts._

The old man turned from the bookcases and started him straight in the eye.

"I _do_ trust you."

"I know," he swallowed harshly.

Dumbledore broke the eye contact and made to move towards the door, but paused after a step.

"One more thing, Severus."

_There was always one more thing._

"Minerva has expressed some concern…she is worried that Miss Granger might feel some attraction towards…some interest in the Dark Arts."

It took all of his control to keep his face from flinching. He carefully raised a skeptical eyebrow.

"The girl that knit hats for house elves?"

Dumbledore's lips curved into an amused smile. "I know it sounds ridiculous, but all the same I'd appreciate it if you kept an eye on her."

"Of course."

The Headmaster looked at him seriously for a moment.

"Of anyone, you would know what to look for."

_Why did that make them trust him more when it should make them trust him less?_

He waved off the seriousness of the accusations.

"Minerva is just jealous that Miss Granger picked an independent study in Defense rather than Transfiguation."

This drew a hearty laugh from Albus.

"Quite true, my boy, quite true."

The headmaster left and the door clicked shut behind him. Severus sat silently, feeling more utterly alone than he had ever felt. He had lived his life alone, from his childhood as an outcast to his adult life as a loner and a spy, yet he had never felt this completely cut off from other people.

Before, he had always been on a side. First the Slytherins, then the Death Eaters, then the Order. It was lonely to stand with no one but yourself, with no one but a dead woman.

x

x

Another Hogsmeade weekend had come and as had become custom, Harry and Hermione had both hung behind, using the free time for their study of the Dark Arts rather than spending the carefree time with their friends in the village.

Harry entered the 7th year girls dormitory room as soon as the last student had started out down the path to Hogsmeade.

"A lot of guys would be jealous of how much time I spend in the girls' dormitory," he remarked as she drew the curtains shut, blocking out the midday sun and cloaking the room in a dim coolness. He shrugged off his outer robes and settled on her bed as she pulled out her notebook.

"I tried to find you on Wednesday night to study."

"I was with Dumbledore."

"The trips...with Dumbledore...are you still taking them?" She asked. In her own turmoil, she had forgotten about the fact that Dumbledore was taking Harry on secret trips away from the school.

"Yes. And before you ask, no, I can't tell you much. There are things that we need to find. That's really all I should say"

"And these trips...are they...successful?"

"Sometimes they're just dead ends. Sometimes though, we find what we're looking for."

They studied in silence for a few moments as she watched Harry mime slicing curses out of the corner of her eye. Suddenly he paused and turned to her.

"Do you think that this is dangerous?"

Hadn't she wondered the same thing herself?

"I don't think so," she replied, sounding more sure than she felt. "I mean, magic is about intent. And our intent isn't evil, so how can the magic be?" she reasoned.

This seemed to assuage his fears as he relaxed a little.

"Maybe you should try casting one."

"Really?" he seemed simultaneously hesitant and excited.

"Yeah, you've been practicing them for weeks now. Try one."

He raised his wand and took a deep breath, displaying a look of concentration she had only seen him use in quidditich.

He pointed his wand towards her fireplace and as she watched, the embers shifted and a small flame of Fiendfyre twisted and sparked in the hearth. She stood up and took a step backwards, nervous at the presence of the dark flame, knowing how hard it was to control.

"H..Harry," she stuttered nervously and he immediately ended the spell. Once the small flame had disappeared, she let out a relieved breath, kneeling beside Harry on her bed.

It was a more advanced spell than Hermione had expected him to pick for his first try. She had to admit she was a little jealous. It was apparent he had a natural talent for these types of spells. What she achieved through hard work and lots of studying, Harry always seemed to accomplish effortlessly.

He lowered his wand and leaned his head back to rest against the solid wooden headboard of her bed.

"How did that feel?" she whispered.

She could see the effect that casting the spell had had on him. His eyes had fallen closed and he was breathing in deep pants. a trail of sweat trickled down his neck into the loose collar of his shirt.

"Incredible," his lips curled into a twisted smile. It was not a smile she had seen on him before. It was not his goofy, little boy smile. This smile was adult, but with a dark edge to it that scared her slightly. She felt the skin on her arm prickle into goosebumps.

"Hemione, I brought you some sweets." The door was flung open. She realized how this must look, the dim light, Harry on her bed with his shirt loosened as they both struggled to catch their breath...

Ron was turning red already.

"I see what's going on here."

"Ron, it's not," she jumped up to try to explain. Harry rose too and she was about to take a step towards Ron when she felt Harry's arm wrap around her and his large hand grip her thigh possessively.

"I'm sorry, mate," he said. She turned her head to look at him with an expression of angry bewilderment, but he wasn't looking at her. His emotionless gaze was still set on Ron.

"I thought you were my friend. You knew I liked her." Ron seemed too stunned to be angry.

She felt the movement of Harry's shoulder against her back as he shrugged.

"I like her too. And I already got her."

Ron threw a Honeydukes bag at her feet, his anger finally boiling to the surface.

"I was buying you candy while you stayed here to fuck him?"

The door slammed shut before she could respond to the accusation. The second they were alone, she pulled away from Harry and turned on him.

"Harry, why did you do that? Why did you have to hurt him like that?"

His expression contained no sign of emotion.

"We can't let him find out what we're doing. It's better this way. He won't bother us. We can have as much time alone as we like and no one will suspect anything."

"Harry…"

"What?" he snapped at her, finally releasing his temper "Would you rather that I told him the truth about what we were doing up here?"

She shook her head as a tear leaked out the corner of her eye, but he advanced on her aggressively, pinning her against the wall.

"How do you think Ron would react to the fact that we've been secretly studying the Dark Arts? That we're using them?"

He stopped his rant for a moment, backing away from her and shutting his eyes and letting out a deep breath.

"It's better this way. It's better if he doesn't know."

She heard the door slam shut behind him and felt her body slide down the wall until she was in a sobbing pile on the stone floor.

x

x

Alcohol. Sex. Dark Magic. He normally restrained himself at these gatherings, being careful to keep his mouth shut and drink only a modest amount, careful about what spells he cast. For nearly twenty years he had kept a tight reign on his self-control. Tonight he had simply let go.

Another drink was pressed into his hand and he downed it without hesitation.

Free. He felt freer than he had in years. He could drink without worrying he was missing valuable information to report to Dumbledore. He could use all the Dark Magic he wanted without wondering if he had gone too far. His soul was already damaged beyond repair, what did it matter anymore? The girl had cast an unforgivable, had taken a step which could not be untaken. It was only a matter of time before she was swept under and took Potter with her. The alcohol silenced the guilt that had been gnawing at him all week.

He let off another curse at some poor captive muggle, too drunk to care whether or not it found its mark.

He would bring Potter to the Dark Lord's side and then it would all be over. Potter would be safe and the Light would fold, would collapse with devastation on the news of the corruption of their savior. The Dark Lord would be victorious and this war, this infernal war that had consumed nearly his whole life would_ finally _come to an end.

This was not exactly what he had had in mind when he had sworn to the memory of the woman he loved that he would keep her son safe from harm. Leave it to a Slytherin to twist his own words. He had envisioned keeping the boy safe until the Dark Lord was defeated and then getting on with his life.

But now it was Dumbledore who wanted the boy dead and the Dark Lord who would give him a chance at life. It was not his ideal scenario, but he could make it work. Severus Snape was nothing if not adaptable. It took a certain kind of flexibility to shift alliances as many times as he had.

But it was not he who had shifted, he reminded himself, taking another drink. The world had shifted. He had simply stayed loyal to his original goals, to Lily, as the world had shifted around him. It was not that he was no longer on Dumbledore's side; it was that Dumbledore was no longer on_ his _side. He had played by others' rules for too long. He was making his own now.

It was only because he had perfected drunken apparition in his youth that he made the return trip unsplinched.

It was only because he had made the trek from the outer gates of Hogwarts to his quarters broken and bloodied from all manner of curses that he was now able to do so in his drunken state.

He flung open the door to his lab and there she was.

Of course.

Of fucking course.

How had he been stupid enough to assume that she would actually leave him in peace?

"You shouldn't be here," he growled. It was well past midnight. If Albus had scolded him about her leaving his quarters shortly after nine, then her being here now was positively scandalous.

"I...I wanted to make sure you weren't hurt." She eyed his unsteady steps as he approached her, slowing backing away from him until she hit the table behind her and could retreat no further.

"Are you? Hurt?"

"No," he breathed, close, too close. And he saw her flinch, no doubt from the impact of the alcohol on his breath. He really shouldn't be this close to her, shouldn't have her pinned up against the workbench, one arm to either side of her.

He had heard them, the rumors earlier in the day about her being caught with Potter in her room.

Wasn't it this the image that had popped into his head before he took his first drink earlier that evening? Hadn't the thought caused an undefined rage to flame in him that could only be put out with another drink?

His eyes scanned the chapter title of the open book behind her.

"What are the seventeen steps to creating an inferious?"

"What?" Her eyes widened, apparently caught off-guard.

He leaned in closer.

"Seventeen steps. Name them."

"I...I don't...I just started the chapter."

He already knew he was going too far, but was powerless to stop himself. Even he didn't understand why he was doing this to her.

"Maybe if you spent less opening your legs for Potter and more time opening a book, you would know the answer."

He heard the slap, but was too far gone to feel any real pain from it besides a distant, dull sting.

"I was teaching him Dark spells, you prick. Just like you wanted me to do."

And she was around him and out the door before he had time to fully process what she had said.

He was letting himself get carried away, get distracted from his original goal. If she was fucking Potter, she would have even more control over the boy than she already did. If she was fucking Potter, it was better for his purposes, wasn't it? Why did he even care?

He collapsed into a chair.

His tightly-controlled world was spinning wildly out of control.

* * *

_A/N: Sorry this chapter took soooo long. It was a very difficult one to write, especially with moving from one side of the country to the other. It's a long-ish chapter, just for you...because you waited. The next one is already half written, so it should be up much faster._ _Please review this one!_


	8. Devil's Eye

Chapter 8: Devil's Eye

In the gray-blue sober light of the morning, it was obvious that his plan was failing. She had been scared, had been pulling away since she had cast the unforgivable curse and he had been too distracted by his growing attraction to her to notice.

Last night she had run. His plan hinged on her implicit trust of him. And he had forced her to run. Damn.

She was pulling away from him and he couldn't lose her. _He couldn't fail Lily._

But it wasn't over. He had to drag her back in.

Hermione Granger didn't show up in his office to study that night. Or the next. He needed something that would pull her back to him, that would spark her curiosity, her thirst for knowledge. He needed something that would keep her addicted to what he was giving her. He knew just the potion.

It took three nights to brew. He saw no sign of her except for in his class where they both ignored one another. His nights were spent over his cauldron, coaxing the disparate ingredients into a pale yellow liquid. A thin smoke rose in circuitous strands from the cauldron, dissipating silently into the air.

The door was locked and warded.

_He could go to Azkaban for this. Not even Albus would save him if he knew what his Potions Master was brewing._

If he could just get her to drink it, she would no longer have thoughts of turning back. If he could just get her to taste it, she would no longer have any desire to turn away from the Darkness.

On the fourth night, he sent a note requesting her presence in his office.

She stepped inside the laboratory and closed the door behind her, but did not move from the threshold.

"I slapped you," she stated bluntly from across the room.

"Yes."

"Are you going to punish me?"

"No."

She stared at him silently.

"I am fully aware that I deserved it," he added.

She still looked at him skeptically as if expecting the real punishment to come any second.

"I should not have pried into your personal life." It was as close as he would ever come to an apology.

"No, you should not have."

"I was obviously not in a normal frame of mind."

"You were drunk."

"Yes."

She pursed her lips disapprovingly.

"Do not let our personal interaction stand in the way of your education. Your study of the Dark Arts, this war, is all far too important for that."

She nodded finally, relaxing a little and leaving her spot by the door. She set down her books and moved towards the supply cabinet as if to gather ingredients to make a potion. He impeded her progress.

"Sit."

She looked at him curiously, but kept silent.

"We're going to do something different tonight. Tonight I am going to teach you wandless magic."

She sunk onto the stool behind her, still looking skeptical.

"But sir, that takes years of study."

He allowed himself a small smile, nothing but a faint quirk of his lips.

"There is…somewhat of a shortcut for those unafraid of the Dark Arts."

He lifted several vials of the potion from the drawer in which he had hidden them, placing them on the counter before her for her inspection.

She would not know what it was. The potion was only mentioned in a handful of books and he had not given her any of those to read yet.

"What is it?" she asked, scrutinizing the pale yellow liquid.

"There are many names for it…Second Sight Potion, Devil's Eye, Dark Vision."

_Even a single vials of the stuff could have gotten him well over a hundred galleons on the black market (if he was interested in that sort of thing).  
_

"What does it do?"

"It is used as an aid in teaching wandless magic. It allows the drinker to experience, to see their magic. Once a wizard can visualize his magic, it is easier to manipulate it even without the potion."

_He could get twelve years in Azkaban just for brewing the stuff, another fifteen for giving it to her. She could get twenty for ingesting it._

She held the vial up to the light, watching the way the potion moved as she tilted the vial, her lips parting with curiosity.

"Go ahead. Drink it."

He tried not to notice the way her lips closed around the vial, the way her tongue darted out to get the last drop. That sort of thinking is what had gotten him into this mess in the first place.

He watched as her eyes glazed over and her pupils dilated, the potion taking effect.

"This…this isn't right. I feel…I...I feel…." she slurred, gripping the edge of the table and looking at him accusingly, "You…you drugged me."

"No. What you are feeling is simply the potion working the way that it is supposed to work."

But he could see the panic in her eyes.

He had to calm her down, to assuage her fears or she wouldn't be relaxed enough to let go and truly experience the potion.

"What are you doing to me? What are you trying to do?" She tried to stand, leaning against the table for support.

He made eye contact with her and grabbed a second vial, tipping it to his lips, and draining the entire thing.

"I need you to trust me," he told her firmly, still holding her gaze.

His act had calmed her slightly as she seemed to relax, leaning back against the edge of the table as her breathing slowed. The fact that he would drink it too had reassured her that he meant her no harm.

A wave of his wand extinguished the lights and they were plunged into total darkness. This drew a startled gasp from her.

"It's easier in the dark...easier to see."

And sure enough, he could start to see the edges of his own magic now, the millions of brightly glowing strands strumming through his body, pulled taught by unseen forces. They pulsed through him, steady and powerful. He had always thought of his magic as an ocean before a storm, a deep, calm power that could turn violent and deadly at any moment.

His gaze traveled across the room to where she stood. He could see her magic now. It was not a child's magic. Her magic was fully formed. It strummed and pulsed around her. He had tried so hard to convince himself that she was a child and was now confronted with evidence to the contrary. If his magic was an ocean, then hers was a river, spilling forth with energy and momentum that would crush anything in its path._ Power._

It was not a child's magic.

In the dim glow of the strands of her magic, he could see that her eyes shone with excitement. And he knew he had her once again.

"Cast a spell," he instructed, his voice sounding rough and foreign in the darkness, "something simple."

She held up her wand and whispered, "Lumos." And her eyes widened as she felt it, the magic being pulled from her and through her, directing, focusing through her wand to produce the light.

She held the glowing light on her wand, taking short, shallow excited breaths as he began to pace back and forth between the workbenches.

"Devil's Eye is a Dark potion with hallucinogenic properties. It heightens your senses, makes you able to feel your magic and translates these feelings into images. Having a mental picture of what your magic looks like helps you to visualize it enough to perform wandlessly, even later when the potion is not being used."

_There are worse fates than Azkaban. If Albus came down here now…._

He stopped his pacing and faced her.

"I am going to cast a spell on you and I want you to deflect it."

She nodded and raised her wand.

He cast a mild stinging hex and watched as the light left his wand and hurled through the space between them.

He watched her shield herself against the spell, felt his magic graze over hers and had to stifle a gasp.

He had never taken the potion in the presence of another. Was it always this…intimate? Feeling her magic against his was almost like touching bare skin.

He shivered.

It took him three strides to cross the room to where she stood. His long fingers pulled her wand from her loose grasp and set it down on the counter.

"Now cast a spell," he whispered in the darkness. "No wand, no words. Control and direct your magic."

She held her hands before her and cupped them. Her eyes slid shut and a look of intense concentration appeared on her face. He could see the strands of her magic pulse and shimmer and she bent them to her will. Taking deep breaths, she slowly opened her eyes as a radiance began to emanate from her cupped palms. It began as a dim flicker but grew stronger and brighter.

She held the light in her hand, stared at it entranced. Her downturned face was bathed in the soft glow of the light she held. Her hair rustled slightly as if blown by an invisible wind. _Beautiful._

She didn't notice him come up behind her until she felt his warm breath on her neck.

"This, Hermione, this is what power feels like."

He could feel her shiver against him.

His lips brushed against the exposed flesh of her neck and she moaned softly, leaning back into him. His body was on fire everywhere it touched hers. He let his tongue dart out against her neck, tasting the salty sweat.

She turned in his arms, releasing the light she had held between her hands and burying them instead in his hair. He caught her lips as she turned, pulling her into a brutal kiss, feeling himself harden against her hip at the contact.

He stepped back suddenly, leaving her panting and unsteady in the center of the room. _Control_. He needed to control himself. _If Albus knew…_

"You should get back to the dormitory," he forced the words out quickly before he lost the will to say them. He was her teacher and this was not allowed.

She fled from the room and he flung open the door to his bedroom, passing through it quickly to the bathroom where he leaned over the sink and splashed cold water on his face before raising his head to stare at himself in the mirror.

And then he was laughing, laughing at himself for being distraught over crossing the line with her when he was betraying his role as her teacher in much deeper and more dangerous ways. Laughing at himself for being worried about losing his job when he was teaching her things that could get him sent to Azkaban. It was quaint, almost, to be so concerned with violating her body when he was so intent on ripping her soul.

x

x

* * *

_A/N: This last paragraph was actually the first part of this story that I wrote. People would see it as wrong for them to have a relationship because he is abusing his power as her teacher, but I thought that being who they are and living during this war, there are far worse ways that he could abuse his power. I had an explosion of writing over the last week and should be updating regularly now. Please review the story. Tell me what you think so far.  
_


	9. That Dark Drug

_"The Dark Arts are many, varied, ever-changing, and eternal."-Severus Snape, Book 6_

_x_

_x  
_

Chapter 9: That Dark Drug

Hermione had returned the next evening to find the professor conspicuously absent. She didn't mind. She was still confused from the other night and wasn't sure if she could face him yet...wasn't sure _how_ to face him. In the center of the immaculate laboratory, four vials of the pale yellow potion sat on the countertop with a note written in his small, harsh script.

_To share with Mr. Potter._

_x_

_x  
_

She had taken the potion with Harry two nights in a row now. They had cast spells with wands and without, watching carefully how their magic moved and shifted to adapt to changing stimuli. She began to have a better idea of her magic, began to be able to picture it, to feel it even when she was not taking the potion. It was strange, to have lived with something for so long without knowing it. It had been a part of her for as long as she could remember, yet it was only now that she was starting to see its true form. She had used her magic, had cast spells without really understanding what she was doing or how it worked. It was as if she had spent her whole life in the darkness and someone had just switched on the light.

She stared at Harry from across the room, seeing his magic strum steadily as he focused it. The strands wove and rewove themselves as he cast a spell. He was learning something, finally, was developing and focusing that power that would help him defeat Voldemort. She watched him and felt angry that Dumbledore, with all his power and knowledge, had not taken Harry under his wing the way she had always imagined he would, had not given him special knowledge and skills to prepare him for his inevitable confrontation with the Dark wizard.

He had taken Harry away from the school on 'missions' during this school year, but as far as she could tell, he had not even taught Harry anything that would specifically help him with these. For a man who knew hundreds if not thousands more spells than the average wizard, this lack of instruction was disappointing.

She watched once more as her friend focused his magic.

Harry had seemed different in these past few days, less conflicted. It was as if he was more at peace with himself than she had ever seen him.

"This is incredible," he whispered, almost to himself as he levitated a quill shakily, his eyes alight with possibilities.

"Yes," she agreed. "It is."

He set the quill back on the table and relaxed into a chair.

"It's like for the first time I don't feel like a scared little boy who has an evil wizard coming after him. I mean, I know that Voldemort knows some really advanced magic, but for the first time I actually feel...powerful." He looked at her with a hesitant expression. "For the first time, I feel like I might be able to do it."

Harry had been excited about what the new potion could do. They had spent most of their time concentrating on wandless magic. It was something they had both watched enviously as older, more powerful wizards performed effortlessly over the years. She could now produce simple magic without a wand.

It was a powerful feeling, to be able to control things without spells, without a wand, simply by the strength of your will.

This is what Snape had been speaking of that first day of Defense classes. This was the nameless, evershifting magic of which he spoke in those low, wistful tones. This was the heart of the darkness, beyond spells, beyond words. She had been waiting for this since she had first discovered the world of magic.

Hermione had never admitted it to anyone, but she had been disappointed in her first year of school when she had discovered magic to be nothing more than a set of formulaic spells to memorize. She had wanted this, this innate, unnamable power that she now felt.

_And he had kissed her._

They had still not dealt with that impulsive event.

She never would have expected Professor Snape to do something like that, to even look at her in that way, with that hunger…but he had. And it had made her feel…well, if she had to pick a word..._powerful_.

That she could cause a man like that to abandon his self-control had been a feeling of power rivaling the wandless magic she had performed. She felt both elated and terrified. When she had felt his erection press against her hip, she had known that she had caused it, that she had aroused that cold man, that she had the power to tease his iron-tight self-control. It was a feeling unlike any she had felt.

There was a part of her that wanted to feel it again.

Harry went back to his room and Hermione took the stairs slowly, still drifting down from the high of the potion.

_What the fuck are you doing?_ shouted the little voice in the back of her head, but she found herself ignoring that voice more and more these days.

She opened his door wandlessly and without asking permission. It was not her scheduled time to be there and he looked up from his desk with mild surprise.

Her heart beat rapidly in her chest. What did she think she was doing?

"Miss Granger," he said sharply, standing as she approached him.

"What happened before…"

His hand raised to cup her cheek even as he spoke the words.

"...can't happen again."

She stepped closer to him, lifting herself up on her toes until her lips met his, slipping her tongue between them. It was power that she was high on. The power of her own magic…the power that her body had over this man.

"Miss Granger…"

"Hermione," she interrupted him.

"Hermione," he whispered silkily with a faint, dark grin.

x

Against his better judgment, his hand slipped into her hair and he angled her head, taking control of the kiss.

She was right, really. What did it matter in the big scheme of things. Within the year, Voldemort would rule everything, Potter would be by his side and the girl would be (well, he wouldn't lie to himself) most likely dead. What did it matter if he took his pleasure from her now? She wanted it. What did it matter if he let her taste a bit of ecstasy?

No matter what moral code he used, he had already crossed way beyond the line of anything that would be considered ethical. What did one more transgression matter?

Especially a transgression as tempting as this one.

Her pupils were dilated, he suspected from potion use. That was good, it meant she was teaching Potter, experimenting with that Dark drug that would let them taste the irresistible power. He brushed a stray strand of hair away from her face.

"This is a bad idea," he told her even as his hand crept up her smooth thigh, relishing the feel of her soft flesh as he lifted her onto his desk.

"A very bad idea," she assured him, spreading her legs wider so that he could get closer. He stepped between them, pressing himself against her.

Momentarily he wondered if she was a virgin, but discovered that he really didn't care.

His other hand caressed her breast through her thin blouse.

_He was doing this for her, to give her a taste of pleasure before she was lost to the Darkness._

The hand that had slid up her thigh now rested in the junction between her legs, rubbing her through the damp cloth of her knickers.

_He was doing this for himself. He was a selfish, selfish man._

His finger pulled at the elastic and slipped underneath.

_Screw morality._

One hand went for his belt buckle, and, unable to wait any longer, with the other, he slipped one long finger inside...

A knock sounded at the door and they froze.

"Fuck," came his soft exhalation, his finger still inside her even as he felt her tense. The panic at the possibility of being caught warred with the exquisite feeling of the moist heat wrapped around his finger, the impulse to abandon all caution and start thrusting it in and out of her cunt until she clenched around him, until she begged him to fuck her while whoever it was stood waiting on the other side of the door.

"Severus, are you there?"

The Headmaster.

_Fuck._

Pulling away from her, he sat swiftly in his chair, his erection concealed within the folds of his robes. She slid off the desk onto shaky feet and smoothed down her skirt. He gave her a quick nod and waved open the door.

"Oh." The Headmaster entered with raised his eyebrows. "I was not aware that you had company."

His finger was still damp, coated in her juices that were quickly drying in the cool dungeon air.

"Miss Granger just stopped by with a quick question."

Albus' eyebrows had still not lowered.

"I was in the middle of finishing my response."

"I guess I should go now," she finally spoke up, evidently anxious to leave.

"I'll walk you up, Miss Granger. I just stopped by to let Severus know that Professor Sprout is ill and his assistance is required harvesting the Devil's Snare."

He nodded carefully to this implied request. Of course he would do whatever dangerous, demeaning, or insignificant task the Headmaster put before him. As if he really had any choice.

The old man turned back towards the door, holding it open.

"After you, Miss Granger."

x

She nervously walked up the stone stairs beside the Headmaster. Her heart was beating so fast she thought it might explode. What did he know? What did he suspect? What was he going to do to her? She didn't have the sort of relationship with the man that Harry did. Most of her experiences with him were watching him in a crowd. She could count the number of times he had spoken to her one-on-one.

Expulsion seemed not so bad now that there was the very real possibility of going to Azkaban.

They reached the top of the stair and he stopped. She had a strong urge to keep walking, to not look back, but she knew that wasn't possible. She steeled herself and looked up into his face. If he was going to arrest her, she told herself, he would have led her into an office full of Aurors. And if he was going to expel her, he wouldn't do it in the middle of the corridor. She took a deep breath.

Uncharacteristically, he cut straight to the point.

"Harry is very important."

Whatever she had suspected him to open with, it had not been that.

"Of course," she agreed hesitantly, unsure of where this was leading.

"You are very close to him. I am sure you are not unaware of the influence you have on him."

She swallowed roughly. It was as if the harder the tried to act calm, the more awkward she felt. Her hands hung loosely by her sides. Was there something that people normally did with their hands?

"He has been through a lot and I am afraid that he must go through even more. His mental state is of the utmost importance...and anything that would disturb that, that would upset him, well, it is important that we avoid those things."

"Yes," she agreed again, not sure of what she was even agreeing to. "Of course."

"I'm glad we both understand," he said, although she wasn't really sure she understood at all.

He bid her goodbye, but the twinkle in his eye, appeared to her as more of a suspicious glint.

He suspected something, something he was afraid might upset Harry. But what exactly he suspected, she didn't know. She had passed the normal bounds of teacher-student relationship with the Potions Master, but she wasn't sure whether the Headmaster suspected that the Professor was teaching her the Dark Arts, or if he suspected that the man was having a physical relationship with her.

Both were true.

What was she doing? What the _hell_ was she doing?

She needed to think, had to think this through. She had to go over every little detail of her encounter with the Headmaster over the past few months, anything he might have seen, that he might have heard, that would give her some idea what he was thinking.

She sank down into the soft cushions on the couch in the thankfully-empty Gryffindor common room and shut her eyes.

The door slammed open loudly and someone stomped in, swearing.

Her eyes flew open to see Harry dressed in his quiditch uniform.

"Malfoy, fucking Malfoy," he cursed, throwing his broom violently across the room.

"What happened?"

"He tried to push Ginny off her broom, that's what happened."

"Harry, calm down." It wasn't that she had never seen him this irrationally angry before, but usually he would go mope by himself after a short explosion. The fact that the game had ended an hour ago meant that this rage had been burning for a while.

"He's dangerous, Hermione. He should have been expelled a long time ago. Someone's going to get hurt."

"He's a student here, Harry, they can't just kick him out for something that might have been an accident."

She knew he wasn't in the mood to listen to reason, but she tried anyway.

"I mean, are you sure...that it wasn't an accident?"

"Of course I'm sure. He tried to hurt Ginny. That's the problem with you, Hermione. You're too fucking trusting."

She needed to think. What she had done with the Professor was nothing compared to what she had been _prepared_ to do. In that moment, she would have let him do anything he had wanted to her. When she had felt his hand move between them on his belt buckle, she had known exactly what was going to happen. And she had _wanted_ it. What was she doing? What was wrong with her? She needed to think. She needed to get everything straightened out in her head. She didn't _need_ this right now.

Harry grabbed his broom and stormed off to find Ron.

Hermione went back to her room, hoping that it would be empty, but unfortunately Lavender was braiding Pavarti's hair as they discussed the latest Winter line from Madam Malkin's. She sat on her bed for a while with her eyes closed, but no matter how much she tried, she could not tune them out.

There had to be _someplace_ she could think.

With a mumbled, "I'll be in the library," she grabbed a book at random and headed out of the room. The castle was starting to feel as it if was trapping her, was closing in on her at every turn, was getting tighter and more crowded with every second. She needed to _think_. Why couldn't she think?

She looked up and froze as a dark figure simultaneously stopped in mid-step coming towards her at the other end of the narrow corridor.

"What did you tell him?" he hissed, approaching her quickly.

"I..." she started, but he didn't let her finish.

"My office. Now." His tone didn't leave any room for argument.

He turned on his heel and strode off towards the dungeons as she hurried to catch up with him.

He rounded the corner and stopped suddenly, causing her to almost run into him. She stepped around him to see what had stopped the man in his tracks.

It was Harry. Of course it was Harry. She cursed herself for not having done more to help him earlier that afternoon. He stood facing Malfoy in the corridor, wands drawn. And she knew, should have known, that they had been heading towards this since the little green-eyed boy had first stepped off the train at Hogwarts.

The look in his eyes gave her a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach.

"Harry," she shouted, but he wasn't paying attention to her.

And she knew what he was going to do before he did it. She thought she saw something for a split-second, a flash of red in his eyes. And then his lips twisted into a violent sneer of which she had only seen traces but had never really thought him capable.

And she knew. She _knew _what was coming next. But everything was moving too fast and she was powerless to stop it.

"_Crucio_," he sneered in a voice she had not heard before, in a voice she could not identify with the sweet, innocent boy that had become her friend at age eleven.

Draco screamed and then time stopped.

xx

The boy had cast it, an unforgivable.

In a life dominated by so much failure, he was unused to the feeling of triumph.

He felt his lips curl into a smile. _His plan was working._ He turned his head and saw her staring not at Potter but at him, a look of complete and utter horror etched on her face.

Too late, he realized,_ he was still smiling._

He could see it in her eyes…that she _knew_. She knew what he was doing to Potter, what he was using her to do. In his moment of triumph, he had given it all away.

And then she was gone, took off down the hall before he could stop her.

He _needed_ to stop her.

x

x

* * *

A/N: Thank you to everyone who reviewed the last chapter. So she knows he's been working towards Harry's corruption and has been using her to do it...

If you're reading this, it would make me very happy if you would leave a review and let me know what you thought of the story.


	10. Flight or Fight

Chapter 10: Flight or Fight

He stood there, frozen, as her fleeing form disappeared around the corner at the end of the hallway. The only thought in his mind was that he had to stop her.

Readying himself for the chase, he took one last look back at the scene behind him and realized that pursuing the girl would hate to wait. Draco was passed out on the floor, his body twitching slightly from the after-effects of the Cruciatus. Potter stood over him, staring blindly at the body as if in shock.

No, he would lose some precious time, but he couldn't leave them like this for anyone to discover.

"Go to the hospital wing," he ordered Potter, who seemed dazed enough to obey without question. "Wait for me there."

All his work, all his plans...it would all be for nothing if he couldn't make her stay. Casting an unforgivable had been a big step for Potter, but there was still work to be done before the boy's soul lay in the palm of his hand.

He levitated Draco's body and hurried it to the hospital wing. But all he could think about was how to find her, how to convince her to stay.

She wouldn't go to Dumbledore…she couldn't. He had manipulated her, but he hadn't forced her into anything. If she went to the Headmaster, she would have to admit her own guilt as well. And she knew as well as he did the sentence for that.

Thankfully, Poppy was not in the hospital wing when he arrived. The room was empty except for Potter who sat silently on a cot, staring absently out the window. Placing Draco on another cot, he rummaged through the potions stores, before picking out a blue vial and shoving it into Potter's hand.

The boy was still trembling slightly.

"It's a relaxant. Drink it."

Potter did, laying down on the cot to drift off to sleep.

Next, he dealt with Draco, acutely aware that this was already taking more time than he had. It was easy enough to mask the signs of the Cruciatus. He added a few marks and scratches, topping it off with a black eye to make it appear that a physical fight had taken place instead of a magical one. Finally, he cast a modified Obliviate that would mess up the boy's memories without erasing them entirely. It was just enough to disguise the fact that the Golden Boy of Gryffindor had just cast his first unforgivable curse. Poppy could find traces if she looked, but why would she look? Who would ever suspect?

His time in the hospital wing had taken far longer than he intended and he knew he didn't have many more moments to spare.

She couldn't go to the authorities, not if she knew what was best for her. And she wouldn't flee, not without Potter. She wouldn't leave Harry Potter here at Hogwarts without her, especially not after what she had just witnessed. And if she tried to take Potter from the school, well, that couldn't happen. He would find her. He would talk some sense into her, tell her whatever she needed to hear to make her stay. He could come up with some story, some excuse.

And if she wouldn't listen...well, he could always kill her. Even as he formulated the idea, he knew that he couldn't do it. What was his problem? He had killed before. It couldn't be that he was attracted to her; he had killed attractive women. That couldn't be it. Was it that he had seen her magic? Had felt it against his? There had to be some reason why his mind protested the very notion of turning his wand on her. Killing her wasn't an option; he _had_ to make her stay.

Using his professorial password, he flew through the Gryffindor common room and into the girls' dormitory. He flung open the door to her room to find it empty. Where else could she be? He headed back down the stairs, thinking of nowhere else to check but the library, when a sound from the other staircase caught his attention.

Taking the stairs two at a time, he flung open the door to the boys' dormitory and there she was. She had Potter's trunk on the bed and was throwing things into it.

"I'm taking him. We're leaving," she stated, not even looking up from her packing to acknowledge that he had entered the room. Potter's invisibility cloak joined the items already in the trunk.

"He will never survive out there. The two of you will be caught within a week. You will never make it on your own."

She didn't even pause in her desperate attempt to pack. He slammed the truck shut and leaned down on it forcing her to finally look at him.

"You are leading him to his death."

"And what is it that you're doing?"

"I am trying to save him."

Her wand was out and pointed at him in the blink of an eye. He had known she would yell at him, would have a fit, but he had not expected her to pull her wand quite so quickly.

Ron, or even Harry, would have known that when Hermione was in that mood that hexes would be cast, but she had always kept her temper in check in front of teachers so it now caught him by surprise.

It was the first time he had felt afraid of her, of what she might do. She was terrified, desperate. He could sense that, could sense that in her desperation she was willing to do anything. He could sense that the normally rational girl had become completely unpredictable. She was like a cornered animal, acting only with a part of her brain based in fear. A cornered, desperate animal was always the most dangerous.

"I trusted you," she screamed at him fiercely, tears rolling down her cheeks as she took rapid, erratic breaths. "I lied to everyone, to _everyone_ that I cared about…for you. I risked expulsion and Azkaban because you asked me to. I let you…" she took a large gulp of air, "I let you touch me. Oh God. And you were just using me…the whole time…to destroy my best friend...to destroy everything."

"I should have known," she rambled on. "I'm so stupid. I should have known from the second you praised me. I should have known you were up to something. All those years and you never praised me, not until you wanted something."

She pointed her wand at him menacingly.

"I'm taking Harry and we're leaving."

He took care not to make any sudden movements.

"Don't," he said simply.

She was backing away from him, moving towards the door.

"Then tell me, tell me one thing and I'll stay."

He stared at her. She couldn't leave with Potter. He would tell her anything.

"Who are you loyal to? And don't you dare tell me Dumbledore."

"Myself. Only myself," he answered quickly.

"Don't lie to me, Snape. I've seen you put yourself in danger enough times to know that's not true."

He hesitated a moment too long and she took another step backwards towards the door.

He had run out of lies. The truth was the only thing that might make her stay.

"Lily," he finally relented in one last attempt to stop her from leaving. "Lily Evans… Lily Potter."

She froze.

"Harry's…"

"Yes."

She stared at him with a blank expression on her face.

"Did you love her?"

"Yes."

"Oh."

She stood there staring at him.

No more lies.

"Don't you understand? He has to join the Dark Lord. This is the only way he will live."

She was silent for a long moment as she processed the information. And then she asked the question that he had never suspected she would ask…the one question that Gryffindors were supposed to never ask.

"And what happens to me? When Harry is at the Dark Lord's side and you are collecting your reward, what happens to me?"

He was silent. He knew as well as she did that neither side wanted to see a Muggleborn schooled in the Dark Arts.

Her wand arm fell to her side and she stared out the window, musing almost to herself, "But Voldemort wouldn't kill me outright, would he? It would be so much better if Dumbledore was somehow involved or implicated. Harry would be so much more willing to turn against him."

She stared silently out the window and then turned back towards him, her momentary moroseness giving way to her previous rage.

"I don't know much about her, about Lily, about her life. All I know is her death. But she didn't hand her child over to the Dark Lord and she didn't try to make deals with him. She cared for her son, but she also cared for the wizarding world. This_ isn't_ what Lily would have wanted."

His rage boiled. _How dare this girl presume to know Lily._

"Do NOT say her name." His expression grew fierce as he screamed at her. "Do NOT pretend that you know her, that you have _any_ idea who she was or what she would have wanted."

"You're selling out the entire wizarding world out for a dead woman who didn't even care about you when she was alive?" Her tone was edged with disbelief even though her words hit him as a cold taunt. "You're still devoted to a woman who married another man."

All his rage, at Lily for choosing Potter, at Dumbledore for using him, flamed inside him and the confusing chaos of the past three months came boiling to the surface. This crazy journey he had been on since Dumbledore had told him the plan, everything came crashing down on him at once.

"You know_ nothing_. You are _nothing_ compared to her. Don't act like you're some angel. I didn't force you into anything. I taught you because you wanted it, because you asked for it."

He stormed past her and through the open door, slamming it wandlessly behind him. She leaned against the wall, letting her body slide down against it until she was crumpled in a ball on the floor. Finally, she let out the huge wracking sobs she had been holding inside since she had seen Harry cast the unforgivable.

Where could she go? What could she do? He had left her with nowhere to turn.

She cried until she couldn't cry anymore and then she laid there in silence on the stone floor taking in large, shuddering gulps of air.

_What had he meant when he had said it was the only way for Harry to live?_

_

* * *

_

_A/N: Thank you everyone for the reviews. Hermione has some big choices to make. Both she and Severus have been pretty much completely unhinged at this point. Please keep reviewing. I have a cold and I really don't feel well. I think that your reviews might be able to help me get better :)  
_


	11. Follow

Chapter 11: Follow

Dried tears are the hardest part.

Crying is easy. Crying is surrender. Crying is letting the emotions take over.

But dried tears ask, "what's next?"

Hermione sat curled up on the cold stone floor of in the empty room, trembling.

What had he meant when he said it was the only way for Harry to live? What did he know that she didn't?

She made her way down to the hospital wing. The door had been left partially ajar and she entered easily. Harry's still body was visible from across the room, reclined on a cot. She moved towards it, suddenly panicked. Why had she run? Why had she left Snape alone with the two boys?

"Miss Granger!" A voice suddenly interrupted her progress as Madam Pomfrey stepped out of her office.

"Harry's just sleeping, but you're welcome to stay with him if you like."

The woman's mild expression gave no hint of the seriousness of an Unforgivable being cast. _She doesn't know_, Hermione realized with a mixture of nausea and relief. Snape had covered it up.

"The boys just got into a little tiff." The older woman rolled her eyes. "You know how boys are."

Hermione forced a sympathetic smile, now close enough to Harry to see that he was indeed breathing the slow, deep breaths of a potion-induced sleep.

The mediwitch stepped out of the room, leaving Hermione standing over her friend's still form.

There was a part of her that wanted to grab Harry and make a run for it, but there was another part of her that was unsure. How could she leave without all the information? _What had Snape meant when he had said that it was the only way to save Harry?_

It was dangerous, going to him; she knew that. But she had been alone with him in Harry's room and, despite all his threats, he hadn't tried to physically harm her.

She made her way down to the dungeons, knocking cautiously on his door. After waiting several long minutes, she knocked again, but there was no answer.

Finally giving up, she turned to find that she was not alone in the corridor. Professor McGonagall was approaching, a curious expression on her face.

"What are you doing down here, Miss Granger?"

"I'm…I'm looking for Professor Snape."

"Professor Snape has left the school today on personal business."

"Oh," she choked. McGonagall gave her a questioning look.

She had the sudden impulse to tell the woman everything, to confess, to beg forgiveness for her sins, to let the woman call in the Aurors and haul Snape off to Azkaban where he couldn't hurt her or Harry.

Would they send her to Azkaban too? Would the Aurors be able to tell she had cast an Unforgivable? Would Snape tell them? She could say he had forced her, but that wasn't true. And what would happen to Harry?

_And what had he meant when he had said it was the only way for Harry to live?_ Above anything else, this was what she needed to know. Maybe it would be her curiosity that would kill her, but that was just who she was and there was nothing she could do to change it. She couldn't act without all the facts.

Making up her mind, she hurried up the stairs to her room where she grabbed her cloak. It was late on a Saturday afternoon and the halls were thankfully deserted as she slipped out the large front entrance. Pulling the hood over her head, she hurried down the path until she had passed through the gate to the school, and Apparated.

She had only one guess as to where he had gone, but it was the right one.

As the cemetery came into view, she spotted a solitary black figure between the gravestones.

She wasn't sure if she would get more answers from him with or without her wand drawn. She settled on wrapping her fingers around it tightly but keeping it out of view in her cloak. The crunching of leaves announced her presence, but he did not raise his head. He sat in the long grass, head hung low, long dark hair obscuring his face.

She stood there for a few minutes at his side, unsure of how to interrupt the man from this private moment.

"You were right," he whispered softly. "It wasn't what she would have wanted."

He raised his head but did not look at her, staring instead with haunted eyes at the worn gravestone in front of him.

"It was my fault," he admitted in a broken whisper. "She died…and it was my fault."

She released her grip on her wand. He seemed too shattered to pose any real threat to her right now.

"And I thought…I thought I needed to do whatever it took to protect the thing she cared enough to die for." He paused and squeezed his eyes shut. "But you were right. She wouldn't have wanted this. She would never have wanted this."

x

It had been so easy, to relapse, to fall back into his old ways. It had been so easy to simply let go of all the control it had had taken to turn his back on the Dark Arts. It had been a relief, almost, to give in to his cravings, to give in to his darker nature.

From the moment he had heard Dumbledore's plan, he had set off down his own path and never questioned its direction, had not let himself truly picture the reality of what he would leave in his wake.

That nagging guilt had been pushed time and time again to the back of his mind. That nagging guilt had whispered that he did not want this girl to die, that he did not want yet another talented Muggleborn to be sacrificed in the struggle for Harry Potter's life.

His eyes locked on the piece of worn stone before him. The girl was right. Of course she was right. In his allegiance to his vow, he had lost sight of Lily. He had lost sight of the woman she had been. If she could see him now...slipping back into the ways she had tried so hard to keep him from...dragging her son and an innocent young girl down with him.

"Lily never would have wanted this," he whispered once again.

He heard the girl's voice from somewhere above him as she asked the question he had never been asked.

"And what about _you_? What do _you_ want? Which side do you wish to be victorious?"

_Sides, a Gryffindor concept._

"I just want this war to be over," he admitted truthfully.

He had switched sides originally for Lily. But to pretend that was still the only reason he spied for the Light would be to pretend that he was still the same wizard that he had been twenty years ago. And he had to admit, at least to himself, that he was not the same wizard who had become a Death Eater at nineteen.

He had first joined Voldemort for the opportunities he promised. He had joined what he had seen as a righteous rebellion. He had followed a charismatic, powerful young leader who spoke of overthrowing the establishment, of bringing down the Ministry. Lucius had passed him Dark Arts books that he had devoured with enthusiasm. He had been curious, of course, but he had also been hungry for the power. He had seen but a glimpse of the powerful wizard that he knew he could become and was prepared to do whatever it took to achieve that goal. He had never thought of the consequences.

And now, all these years later, the Ministry was still as incompetent as ever, but he had to admit that bureaucratic incompetence seemed preferable to a world with Voldemort in charge.

He leaned forward, finally tearing his gaze from the gravestone and staring instead at the yellow, dried grass underneath his feet, tinged with frost.

"I want Voldemort dead. And while maybe Lily never cared about me the way I wanted her to...while she isn't around to see it...I'm not willing to sacrifice her son for that goal."

He squeezed his eyes shut and whispered, "I'm not willing for you to be a sacrifice either."

_Impossible. _He was always wanting impossible things.

They were silent for a few long moments and the sound of the wind stirring the dry leaves filled the silence.

Finally, he asked, "Why did you come here?"

"I need to know what you meant," she replied.

He looked up at her and was met by an expression of intense determination.

"When you said it was the only way for him to live…what did you mean?"

He leaned back so that his head rested on the hard stone surface of the gravestone behind him as he stared upwards at the sky.

"Do you know what a Horcrux is?"

"No."

"There's a reason for that. The Headmaster has certainly kept their existence hidden and I have carefully and purposefully kept the knowledge from you."

He let out a deep breath in a tired huff.

"You might want to sit down."

She knelt beside him in the dry leaves.

"A Horcrux is an object of the Darkest magic. It is a vessel into which a wizard can place a fragment of his soul."

"That sounds horrible."

"The Dark Lord made six."

This had succeeded in shocking her enough that she did not immediately have a question ready, so he continued.

"Albus has been taking Potter on secret missions to destroy all of the six Horcruxes."

"That's good, isn't it?"

"Yes. But what Potter does not yet know is that there is a seventh Horcrux, one which the Dark Lord did not intend to make but that was made nonetheless."

"What is it?"

"I think that 'who is it?' is really a more appropriate question."

A look of disgust crossed her face.

"People…people can be made into Horcruxes?"

"It is rare, but yes."

He expected her to follow up on her original question, but instead she was silent for a few long moments.

"It's Harry, isn't it?"

"Yes."

He turned to see the look of complete horror on her face as she finally grasped the true darkness of their grotesque situation.

"To stop the Dark Lord, Potter must die. The only way for Potter to live is if the Dark Lord triumphs."

She shook her head.

"There has to be another way."

"Do you not think that Dumbledore would have tried everything?" he snapped.

"He doesn't know the Dark, not like you do. He has never felt it call to him, never felt it flow through his veins. He read a book on Horcruxes and decided it was hopeless. If there is one thing I've learned over these past months it is that there is more to something than just reading about it."

She moved to kneel in front of him so that he had no choice but to look at her as she spoke.

"Dumbledore knows nothing; we'll find a way."

x

x

Late afternoon had slipped away and the sun had already begun to set, casting long shadows as it sunk lower and lower over the horizon. They both rose and walked silently side-by-side out of the cemetery. Finally they stopped in front of the statue of Lily, Harry, and James.

She had been right. Of course she was right. Lily would not have wanted him to sacrifice this girl for the life of her son. She would not have wanted him to buy her son's life at the price of his soul. In his shock from Dumbledore's news he had spun off on the wrong path and had never looked back. He had thought only of how to accomplish his goal, not whether it was the right goal.

And now they were back where he had started, in an impossible situation with no answer. But the girl had insisted there was an answer. She had insisted that they would find it. And against his better sense, he had believed her conviction.

He stared at the statue. Lily. How have I chosen the wrong path yet again? Why do I always turn to the Darkness in times of confusion?

"She didn't grow up around here." He suddenly found himself speaking. "She grew up near me. We were friends, even before Hogwarts."

"You didn't grow up in a wizarding community?"

"My father was a Muggle," he spat angrily. "I grew up around Muggle children. Before Hogwarts, I didn't know many magical people, Lily was one of the first, besides my mother."

He turned to the girl, studying her intently as if he'd never seen her before. After everything he had done to her, she had come after him.

"You're so much like Lily in so many ways. Sometimes I wondered if on some level Potter knew, if he was friends with you because he needed that."

His gaze returned to the statue.

"But only in some ways. You're different from her too…very different. She was timid, afraid of things she didn't understand."

"You never would have been able to lure her into the Dark Arts," she whispered.

"Never."

Lily had lacked that thirst for power, that insatiable curiosity that had made Hermione Granger susceptible to his temptation.

Lily had never understood his draw to the Dark Arts; she had never understood the appeal. He had wandered down a different path and she had never forgiven him for that lapse in judgment…_would_ never forgive him…_could_ never forgive him. He had begged her, had slept outside her door, had pleaded, had given up his last shred of dignity, and she had offered no mercy. He had given the last seventeen years of his life to her and he had gotten nothing in return. Dumbledore saw him only as a tool and Lily…Lily was dead.

x

They stood side-by-side and stared in silence at the statue. She felt awkward being here with him, as if she was intruding on something private. This was the woman he loved, made more perfect by death, the flawless ideal for which he was willing to sacrifice everything.

"Can you forgive me?"

She assumed he was speaking to the statue and turned to look at him. But he was not staring at the statue, instead he was looking straight at her.

"Me?" She asked, startled that the question had been directed in her direction.

"I betrayed your trust. I led you into the Darkness. I guided you into danger at every turn."

"Yes." She seemed as surprised as him at her own answer.

"You shouldn't"

"I know."

"I do not deserve your forgiveness."

"I know. I disagree with your methods of course, but how can I hold it against you that you were trying to save Harry's life?"

x

It was her capacity for forgiveness more than anything that separated her from Lily. Her capacity to understand making mistakes, to trust in the goodness of people despite their bad deeds, to believe that people could change.

He had called Lily a mudblood and she had cut him out of her life. After her death, after his role in it, he had worked for years for something he could never get, her forgiveness.

He had done worse to this girl. Every wrong he had ever committed against Lily had been accidental, but with Miss Granger, he had been fully aware of his actions at every turn and had been fully counting on the consequences.

A small blue flower grew up through the stones. Didn't it know that it was winter? That flower had no business growing there, not in the harsh soil or the unfit season. But nevertheless, it grew.

He studied her face and asked her perhaps the more important question.

"Can you trust me?"

She did not answer immediately, but seemed to think it over for a while.

"I trust that we're working towards the same purpose. We both want this to end with Harry alive and Voldemort dead."

"That is enough, I think, for us to work together."

Dark clouds began to gather as they turned to head back. She did not lead them directly to the Apparition point, but took a detour past the small stone church at the edge of the cemetery. They ducked inside as small pellets of hail began to fall.

The church was empty. A single row of candles burned brightly, dripping wax and casting strange shadows on the stone walls. A large, coarse wooden cross stood in the center of the small room.

She crossed the room, trailing her hand along the edges of the wooden pews. Finally, she crossed behind the altar to where a single stained glass window pierced the stonework. The window was made up of blue-green shards and the frozen raindrops outside were faintly visible as they struck the fragments of leaded glass. She stood so close that the bluish light from the window colored her face. Her eyes fell shut.

"My soul.." she whispered. It was a choked fragment, but he understood the question.

"It has suffered irreversible damage."

"I am sorry," he added, genuinely.

She let herself drop down onto one of the rough wooden pews, staring blindly ahead as a single tear rolled down her cheek.

She deserved more than this. She had lost her childhood to this war, and now he had taken her soul as well.

Against his natural inclination, he felt the need to give her comfort, to provide some small refuge from the pain he had caused.

Against his better judgment, he reached out and enclosed her small hand within his.

_Even though had no right to touch her._

She did not pull away, but neither did she turn more fully against him. She simply sat, his larger hand covering her smaller one as she bent her head and sobbed.

"I am so sorry," he whispered.

The hailstones pounded down louder on the roof.

She raised her face and he had a sudden urge to lower his lips to her cheek, wanting to remove the tears he found there, wanting to take her pain away.

But he had no right to kiss her, not after what he had done.

"What else haven't you told me?"

x

x

She slipped her hand back into his as they walked to the Apparition point, allowing him to Apparate her back to school.

Night had finally come, bringing with it darkness and an increasing frost in the air.

Hogwarts loomed in the distance.

"What happens now?" she asked as they began to move towards it.

"I don't know," he replied, but it was undeniable; things had changed.

They approached the front doors of the school to see the Headmaster standing in front of them, a thunderous expression on his face.

She tried to pull her hand from the Professor's grasp, but he held it tightly.

"Miss Granger," Dumbledore greeted coldly as they approached, "we have been worried about you."

"She was with me."

"I see that," the Headmaster replied without a trace of humor in his voice.

"I would like to speak with you in my office. Both of you."

They followed him silently up the stairs and into his tower. Neither candy nor tea was offered.

"I don't suppose that I need to tell either one of you that this is inappropriate…or that you have betrayed my trust."

Her heart pounded in her chest, ready to apologize profusely to the Headmaster, to assure him that his accusations of impropriety were at least mostly unfounded. She glanced over at Snape, expecting to find him equally contrite, but instead he leaned casually back in his chair and met the Headmaster's gaze.

"What are you going to do? Fire me?"

As her jaw dropped open in shock, she faintly heard the Headmaster reply, "You know as well as I that I cannot do that."

* * *

A/N: Sorry I didn't update in so long!! It turns out that graduate school is HARD. This semester totally kicked my ass, but now I have some time off to get lots and lots of writing done before all the craziness starts up again. This chapter is a big turning point in the story. Please leave me a review to let me know what you think.


	12. Demands

Chapter 12: Demands

"_What are you going to do? Fire me?"_

She whipped her head around to see the look of smug satisfaction on Snape's face. There was no trace of his desolation, his repentance from merely a few hours ago and she began to wonder if she had made a horrible mistake.

His words echoed in her ears.

_What are you going to do? Fire me?_

That unspoken name, _Voldemort,_ hung heavy in the air. Even to an outsider, the implication was clear. For Snape to lose his position at Hogwarts would displease the Dark Lord. The termination of his teaching post was the same as a death sentence. It would please neither the Headmaster's sense of justice nor his strategic aims to lose his spy in this manner.

"You know as well as I that I cannot do that."

"I have never asked you for anything, Albus. I have spied for you for almost twenty years without demanding even so much as a raise. I have put myself through unspeakable torture and still I have asked for no special concessions, for no special privileges."

"And now you're asking," Dumbledore stated bitterly.

"Do not misunderstand me. I am not _asking_. I am _telling_ you."

The shattered, broken man from the cemetery was gone, replaced by this man that radiated power and confidence. Hermione wasn't sure if she should feel protected or frightened.

Her train of thought was interrupted by the Headmaster.

"It is against school policy for a teacher to have a sexual relationship with a student."

"Which is why I am telling you that you will look the other way."

Snape leaned forwards in his chair as she struggled to breathe.

"Let me be clear, Albus. Miss Granger will be visiting the dungeons from time to time to engage in all manner of sexual activities. If you do not want to lose your Defense instructor and your spy, you would be wise not to drop by the dungeons during these times."

Her heart raced wildly in her chest. Yes, she had kissed him, but she wasn't sure she was ready for 'all manner of sexual activities.' Dear God, what did that even mean?

The headmaster's focus suddenly turned to her, regarding her intently, as if he had sensed her growing anxiety. "This_ is_ consensual, isn't it?"

"Yes," she managed to whisper, aware that she was giving up her one refuge from the man who had tried to corrupt her soul and now was going to drag her down into the dungeons and have his way with her.

She was terrified at the prospect, or at least she should have been. No, she was definitely terrified, but a deeper, darker part of her was also excited. What was _wrong_ with her? She struggled to remember to breathe.

Snape's hand closed possessively around her wrist and she was flung in the direction of the door, barely able to keep her footing as he dragged her along. The Headmaster's words echoed down the hallway behind them.

"Severus, don't think that I don't know what this little act of rebellion is really about."

x

x

Her heart was hammering so hard she thought it would leap out of her chest as he led her roughly down one flight of stairs and then another and then another, their footsteps moving even more quickly than her racing heart, the quiet slap of leather on stone.

Finally, they reached the lowest level and he flung her unceremoniously into his quarters, slamming the door shut behind him with an ominous bang. She stumbled and then collapsed, landing on her back on the sofa, staring up at him with wide eyes, waiting to see what he would do.

He had told the Headmaster that they would be engaging in all manner of sexual activity.

What did that even mean? What twisted games did he have planned for her?

And this was all her fault. She had been offered a way out and had refused it. And now she was here. With him. Alone.

_A powerful, demanding wizard._

His tall figure towered over her as she tried to prepare herself for whatever was coming.

"Albus will leave us alone."

And then he was across the room, removing his dirty cloak and pouring himself a drink.

It took her a moment to fully absorb his meaning.

She scrambled to pull herself up into a sitting position on the sofa.

"Oh. I thought…" She blushed and looked away as he turned back towards her.

"You thought I dragged you down here to ravish you," he smirked, seeming to enjoy her discomfort.

She blushed deeper.

He took a deep swallow of his drink.

"I got the idea from your and Potter's little escapade…a small lie to cover a larger one."

She looked up at him.

"So if Dumbledore sees me leaving here at all hours of the night, if the doors are locked and silenced and warded, he makes the most convenient assumption?"

"Exactly."

She should feel relieved. It was ridiculous, really, that a small part of her would be disappointed that he didn't want her, that a small part of her felt rejected and unwanted and used.

He finished his drink in another large swallow and poured himself a second without offering her any.

"It is better, sometimes, to let people believe that which they are already inclined to believe."

_A brilliant, brooding man._

"What did the Headmaster mean when he said he knew what this was really about?"

"He knows I feel betrayed by his plan for Potter. He knows I feel used. He thinks this is me acting out, showing him that I have some power to defy him."

"And are you? Acting out?"

A smug grin spread across his face.

"I won't pretend I didn't enjoy the look on Albus' face when I demanded that I be allowed to fuck the Head Girl with his compliance."

_A dark, sadistic, vindictive wizard._

"Who are you?" she murmured, a note of desperation in her voice.

He simply stared at her in response.

"I can't reconcile the repentant wretch from the cemetery with the man who just blackmailed the most powerful wizard alive into submitting to his will."

He stared at her for a few moments but did not answer. She couldn't help wonder if he even knew the answer to the question himself.

_A confused, enigmatic man._

He filled the silence by preparing himself another drink.

"The students will be leaving tomorrow morning for the holidays. You will, of course, want to spend Christmas with your family, but it would be advantageous to our project if you could return to Hogwarts well before the start of the term."

"I'm not leaving for the holidays."

"At all?" he asked, seemingly confused.

She took a deep breath.

"I was planning to spend the time here."

He studied her silently for a moment and she was reminded that he would not have survived as long as he had as a spy if he did not have a certain aptitude for reading people.

"Miss Granger, where are your parents?"

She rose and walked over to the window.

"My parents are on another continent, living under assumed names, with memories wiped clean of all knowledge of a daughter."

"Good girl," he remarked in what seemed like an impressed whisper.

She knew he couldn't have missed the fact that she had been careful not to tell him which continent.

He finished his third drink and set the empty glass down on the table, still looking at her. The silenced stretched between them, thick and heavy.

The constant up's and down's of the past few days had exhausted both of them, physically and emotionally. From his hollow, lifeless eyes, she could tell that he was once more the shattered man from the cemetery.

He sank down into a chair, letting his eyes slip shut as the alcohol he had been pounding since they arrived in his rooms started to take effect.

"Come back tomorrow morning, after the students have left for the holidays. We will...figure out the next step."

She reached the door and paused. She needed to ask, was unable to help herself. But she didn't turn. She couldn't look at him while she asked it. Instead, her fingernails dug into the soft wood of the door frame as she stared at the wooden surface.

"Before…when you touched me…was that just part of the act?"

His voice replied, low and rough.

"I touched you because I wanted to, because I couldn't control myself."

x

x

Harry sat up in the hospital cot, looking not at her, but staring determinedly out the window. The curtain had been pulled around his bed, giving them privacy. And although the ward was empty, Hermione had cast several silencing and privacy spells, just to make sure. She waited, giving him time to speak.

"I cast the Cruciatus."

"I know."

He turned his head towards her.

"I saw you do it," she whispered softly.

"Malfoy was saying things and I…I snapped."

He was terrified, of course. She knew because she had been too. To not even know what you were capable of was a chilling feeling. She remembered her absolute horror at casting an Unforgivable, the complete certainty that she never wanted to do it again, and yet the knowledge that she would do anything to feel that power once more.

Harry let out a deep breath and rubbed his hands across his face.

"I lost control."

And she wanted to tell him that it was_ her_ fault, not his…that she had tricked him into studying the Dark Arts, that the Dark Arts had done this to him.

But she couldn't not yet. She knew, she absolutely knew that she could not tell him what Snape had told her until she had come up with a better solution. She couldn't tell Harry that in order for Voldemort to die, that he himself would have to be killed as well. She couldn't be sure that he wouldn't hurt himself, wouldn't take every death that Voldemort caused as something that he could have prevented. She couldn't go to him until she had a plan. Until then, her only choice was to lie, to keep lying.

"I feel different," he admitted in a horrified whisper.

She reached for the only words she knew, for the ones that had been spoken to her.

"You're just shaken up."

She hated herself for it, but she couldn't tell him the truth, not until she had a plan. She had promised the professor that they would find a way. There was no other choice.

Clasping his hand within hers, she stroked in a comforting way. Harry forced a small smile, as if trying to reassure her that he was alright.

"I'm leaving in the morning. I'm spending the holidays at the Weasley's."

"I know."

"Are you sure you won't come?"

"I got behind on the project I'm doing for Snape. I need the time to catch up."

He let her leave it at that and rose from the bed, walking over to where a small wooden chair had been set near the window. He sat, face buried in his hands, trying to come to terms with what he had done.

He suddenly looked up and met her eyes across the bed. His expression was gravely serious, and laced with fear.

"Hermione, maybe we shouldn't be doing this. Maybe we shouldn't be studying the Dark Arts."

"I don't know, Harry. Maybe you're right. Maybe we should stop for now. I'll do some research. I'll try to find out how dangerous it is, ok? And we won't do anything else until then."

He let out a breath and nodded, reassured by this plan. But she had to make sure.

"Harry, promise me that you won't…that you won't try any spells at the Weasley's, that you won't try anything without me there."

He nodded once again, staring her straight in the eye.

"I promise."

x

x

She fell into bed that night utterly exhausted and discouraged. But that next morning, awaking late to an empty dormitory, everything seemed possible once more and her determination came back stronger than ever. She would find a way to save Harry and time was of the essence. After several hours of scribbling notes, she had finally decided on a place to start her research.

She made her way down to his quarters, feeling free in the empty halls. She found him in the laboratory, bent over a cauldron. His black hair covered his face as he peered down into it and she couldn't help but think that this was the most relaxed she had seen him look in a long time, fully absorbed in his art

He looked up as she closed the door, seeming to snap out of his trance.

"I think it's time to get started," she said, crossing the room towards him.

He responded by extinguishing the flame beneath the cauldron with a flick of his wrist and leaning back against the tall counter.

"And what did you have in mind, Miss Granger?"

She determinedly met his gaze.

"Teach me how to brew the Devil's Eye Potion."

He stared for a few moments.

"Are you sure you wish to continue, knowing everything you now know?"

"Yes."

He looked down for a moment as if to gather his thoughts before he continued.

"You are aware that this is illegal," he spoke, hovering between a statement and a question.

"Very illegal."

"And that it is dangerous."

"Highly dangerous."

"And you wish to continue."

"Yes."

"You believe that there is something in this that will help us find a way to save Potter."

"Yes."

"The potion takes three days to brew."

"Then I suggest we start immediately."

x

x

Three nights of pure torture followed; three tantalizing, frustrating, horrible nights. It was his punishment, of course, for what he had done to her. It was his restitution to sit, night after night, close enough to smell her, close enough to touch her…yet he couldn't touch. He could only look as she bent over the book, scribbling furious notes; as she leaned over the cauldron, her rolled up sleeves, her shirt unbuttoned at the neck.

Yes, this was his torture. And it was exquisite.

Under the pretense of watching to make sure she made no errors in the potion, he set his dark eyes upon her night after night.

He should not have told her that he wanted her. She had caught him at a moment of weakness, in a moment when three generous tumblers of firewhisky had caught up with tumultuous days of temptation, success, destruction, and regret. It was a moment where exhaustion had collided dangerously with self-loathing, where the past had sickeningly crashed into the present, and he had told her the truth.

He had wanted her. There had been no premeditation, no scheme involved. It had been pure, simple lust and his control had failed him.

She wouldn't touch him now, of that he was sure. He was lucky she was even in the same room as him, lucky she had agreed to help him, to continue to work with him even after he had betrayed her so deplorably.

It had haunted his dreams before, wondering how her smooth thighs would feel under his fingertips, wondering how her moan would sound to his ears. Now he knew, and he would give anything to rid himself of that knowledge. It was truly better not to know.

Before, he had been able to excuse his behavior. He had been able to justify it to himself, to tell himself he didn't care what happened to her, to give in to his dark urges.

But he had to be in control now. And control meant not touching her.

But he wanted to. His fingers ached to reach out as she leaned over the cauldron. He wore his thickest robes so that she would never know of his angst-ridden erection.

He was harsher on her than he had been before, barking out instructions and sarcastic criticisms as she attempted to brew a very difficult potion. But the more he criticized, the more relaxed she seemed to become. It was as if the more horrible he was to her, the more reassured she became that he was not still secretly trying to lure her to Voldemort.

So he did the only thing he could do, he watched. He watched with unblinking black eyes that followed her every movement. He watched with a masochistic concentration that pained him. He watched with a throbbing intensity that made her blush.

He should never have touched her at all, he knew that. But there was a voice in the back of his head (or perhaps from somewhere lower) that demanded that he should have moved faster, been more aggressive, that he should have taken her while he had the chance.

She would drive him mad and he deserved every moment of the torture.

x

* * *

A/N: Thanks for all the reviews! They really inspire me to keep writing. I hope you enjoyed this chapter.


	13. The Selvage

Chapter 13: The Selvage

She held the potion up to the light, examining the color and viscosity for any imperfections. None. Just smooth, pale yellow, like a bleached banana.

"Well done, Miss Granger."

She smiled, still looking at the vial.

"This is just the beginning."

Another smile, and then she emptied it down her throat. The sickly sweet taste turned her stomach.

She was prepared for the feeling this time, the potion speeding through her veins, leaving her momentarily dizzy and disoriented. She gripped the edge of the table as her knees buckled.

And then, the flush of power, the feeling of invincibility, leaving her with an eerie sense of calm.

She squinted and winced as both the light from the now-visible magical strands and the glow from the torches invaded her eyes. He cast a spell, lowering the torchlight to an almost nonexistent glow and she relaxed.

"You're not going to take any?" she asked, innocently, raising a vial.

"My wandless magic skills are beyond the point where I need assistance."

"Oh."

"What now, Miss Granger?"

"Could you…could you throw some spells at me?"

He seemed wary.

"Hermione, this potion is traditionally taken alone."

"Why?"

"Many fear another wizard seeing their magic."

"You've already seen mine. And I've already seen yours."

He seemed as if he wanted to argue, but lacked a reasonable argument.

"Could you throw some spells at me?" she repeated.

"If you insist."

The first one was easy, a simple Jelly-Legs Jinx. It was nothing more than a whisper against her shield.

"You can do better than that, Snape," she taunted.

He replied with a mild hex that skimmed the edges of her defense.

"And I was under the impression that you were a Death Eater." Oh, how she liked provoking him.

And finally he cast a real curse that hurled itself at her shields, breaking across them like waves colliding with the bow of a ship. She took a step backwards with the force of it as it washed over her, setting her nerves on fire. The erotic thrill of his magic against hers cut directly to her core. But she needed to stay focused.

"Is that was you were looking for?" he taunted in a low, dangerous voice.

The hexes hurled towards her, one after the other, bombarding her defenses with a sudden violence. She panicked.

And without thinking, without planning, she did more than shield, she retaliated.

"Fuck," he swore and she knew her curse had found its target…and that she had just hexed a professor…that she had just hexed Snape.

Her breath seemed unwilling to leave her lungs.

"You want to duel, witch?" he growled.

She responded by casting a slicing hex which he neatly cast aside.

"I'll take that as an affirmative response."

He stalked her, moving slowly around the table with a practiced ease. She had the advantage of sight as the strands of his magic appeared bright to her while without the potion she would appear as little more to him than a dark outline in the dim glow of the torches to him. But this was his territory, she reminded herself. She wouldn't have been surprised if he managed to navigate in the pitch black.

And he was speaking, his velvety voice seeming to caress her as he spoke. Her heart hammered erratically.

"Although technically hexing your opponent before the duel officially starts is dirty sportsmanship, but I'll like it slide because I like dirty."

She ducked behind a desk as he stalked her. What had she gotten herself into? He had asked if she trusted him and she had been honest. _Maybe. For now._

"You should know, however, that this isn't a polite little wand duel where an innocent little _Expelliarmus _can end the fight. There are no wands to lose here. The duel ends when one opponent is incapacitated. And I hope you know, Miss Granger, that I am not going to go easy on you."

And she had to remind herself to be frightened because all she wanted to do was impale herself on his voice, to orgasm over his low tones.

Another curse and his magic skimmed hers, feeling intimate and sinful. She bit her tongue to hold back a moan.

Focus.

She focused on his magic. The glow was made up of a multitude of strands strumming though his body. They slid through and past each other, crossing and intertwining.

It had seemed random at first, but the more she focused on it, she could start to detect a systematic organization that controlled the strands. There was something that looked familiar about the strands, about the patterns, as if they reminded her of something. They didn't pass straight through one another as in a woven fabric, but each looped and intersected, slithered and wound. It was similar to something she had seen before. She searched her memory for other contexts in which she might have come into contact with such a pattern.

Her thoughts were interrupted as she felt another spell crash against her.

Across the dark room, all she could see of his body was the predatory glint of his eye. It made her wet…wetter. Did he know?

Dear god, she had to end this soon.

Hermione focused her magic and then suddenly they were cloaked in total darkness. She supposed he would still be able to manage, but she needed every advantage she could get.

It was that pattern again, that arrangement that taunted her, hovering on the edges of recognition.

She threw a hex and felt her magic glide across his in a soft caress that made her gasp.

_I touched you because I wanted to._

The air was knocked from her lungs as the black room got impossibly blacker. She felt herself falling to the floor and she distantly realized that he had hit her with a stunner.

x

She awoke with several long blinks, taking a moment to orient herself.

"I…" he started, but then didn't finish. Was this a situation that called for an apology?

She puller herself into a sitting position, but made no move to leave the floor.

"So I guess this means you won."

"I did indeed."

His erection had dissipated when he knocked her out.

She looked up at him, her lips curving into a smile.

"I want a rematch."

He studied her carefully.

"You won't win."

"Let me try."

x

x

This was not how he had intended to spend his vacation, running errands for both the Dark Lord and the Headmaster. In the free time he got between his duties, they dueled non-stop. She was improving slowly, but he had won every time.

She glanced up from the book she was reading for only a brief moment as he entered the room.

"And what did your master have to say this time?" she asked casually.

He smirked as he pulled off the heavy robes, tossing them across the back of his chair.

"Which one of them?"

She put down her book and leaned back.

"Both of them, then."

"Well, the Dark Lord is anxious for progress. He is not happy that the plans need to be put on hold while Potter is away for the holidays, but he is content to know that I am making progress with you."

"Oh, are you?"

"Yes."

"And the other?"

"Dumbledore listens to my reports of the Death Eaters' activities."

"And?"

Severus smiled.

"And he frowns disapprovingly at me every chance he gets."

She let out a soft snort.

"I'll bet he does."

"As if his silent disapproval will convince me to keep my hands off of the Head Girl when his outright pleas did not."

He let his possessive gaze fall on her.

She met his gaze, not flinching under the weight of it but holding it steadily.

Finally, he broke the spell.

"Another duel?"

She looked at him skeptically.

"Are you sure you're up to it?"

"I had two meetings today. I'm annoyed, but not incapacitated."

As had become custom, he extinguished the lights as she downed a vial of the potion.

He felt a weak hex glide past him, her signal that she was ready to begin. He wasted no time in letting her know that he was ready as well.

He cast a spell, letting it wash over her, feeling the delicious friction of magic-on-magic that sent blood rushing to his groin. And as much as he wanted to feel his skin against hers, he knew that the erotic thrill of their duels was the closest he would ever get to touching her.

"Are you taking it easy on me?" she asked from across the room.

"I beat you every time."

"Yes, but you never use anything stronger than low to medium strength hexes."

"There are certain spells that cannot be cast without a wand. Some of the most powerful hexes, for example, as well as all three of the Unforgivables. I use what is available to me."

He demonstrated as he spoke, feeling the hex crash against her shield.

"Oh," she replied, somewhere between a sound of understanding and a low moan. He knew she had felt it too.

The moment stretched taut between them. There had been many of these moments over the past week, each more unbearable than the last. He knew it was only a matter of time until his fragile self-control simply snapped.

He wanted her. It was as simple and as complicated as that. He wanted her with an intensity that was driving him mad.

She stared at him as if she wasn't looking at him but into him. At the magic, he reminded himself.

She squinted, her searching look telling him that there was something she saw but did not understand, that there was a puzzle that eluded her. He felt distinctly uncomfortable under the scrutiny.

He broke her concentration, directing her attention elsewhere as she was forced to concentrate on her defense. He case one spell after another at a pace that she could withstand, but only for so long. And soon enough he had her cornered. All he needed to do was cast one more spell…

And suddenly, he was on his knees, unable to move. It was as if his own magic were holding him in place. The force of it squeezed him like a vise and he let out a strangled cry.

It was unlike anything he had ever encountered.

It was his magic, his entire being held powerless.

And suddenly he was released.

He bent forward onto his hands and knees, struggling to catch his breath.

It was not any Dark magic that he knew, but more to the point, not any Dark magic that he had taught her.

A thought prickled at the edge of his consciousness, causing an uneasy fear to settle in his stomach. Could it be that he was not her only teacher?

He pulled himself to his feet.

"Where did you learn that?" he asked, advancing on her.

He had his wand out and at her throat in an instant as he slammed her small body against the stone wall and held it there.

"Who taught you?"

"Mrs. Weasley," she whispered.

"What?" He released her and stepped back in shock, causing her to grab onto the wall for support as she stared up at him with wide, terrified eyes.

"Mrs. Weasley taught me to knit….when I was making hats for the house elves….the magic, it's all strands and strings and if you know the pattern then all you have to do is pull in the right spot…"

He simply stared at her with his mouth hanging open.

"What?" he repeated, seemingly unable to find any other words.

"The paths that the strands travel, they aren't random. There are patterns…"

He continued to stare at her and she abruptly stopped her babbling.

"Are you seriously telling me that no one has noticed the sequences before?"

"Miss Granger, how large an overlap do you imagine there to be between Death Eaters and knitters?"

"Point taken. But surely someone…I mean, there are women Death Eaters."

"A few. But can you seriously see Bellatrix Lestrange ever sitting down and knitting a sweater?"

A small smirk formed of her lips at this thought.

He let out a deep breath. There were things she should know. Things that as a Muggle-born she would not know.

"Traditionally, only infertile women are allowed to learn the Dark Arts. Belief is that it corrupts the nurturing skills needed for motherhood."

"Bellatrix Lestrange is…"

"Yes. Didn't you think it was strange that a woman who cared so much about blood purity and family lines never chose to continue hers?

Although, there are rumors that she used a potion…that she did it to herself so that she would be free to practice the Dark Arts."

He was tired, too tired to face the implications of this right now before a full night of sleep and a hot shower.

X

X

"I'm going to bed," he said carefully, as if asking her to leave.

"I just need a few minutes for the potion to wear off."

"Very well."

And then she was alone, sitting in the dark laboratory. Her head was swimming with ideas and she couldn't go to bed now, not yet. This had been a breakthrough, but there was something else, some other significance just beyond her grasp. The possibilities of the potion were endless. And she had some ideas she wanted to try…

x_  
_

* * *

_A/N: Thank you to everyone who reviewed. I really appreciate you taking your time to let me know what you think._


	14. Traces

Chapter 14: Traces

Hermione didn't leave the laboratory that night. Ideas twisted and turned in her mind. Sleep would only get in the way.

Roll after roll of parchment was quickly covered with hasty scribbles that looked nothing like her customary neat handwriting.

She had never seen another magical being while under the influence of the potion, but presumably other magical creatures, like house-elves and centaurs, would have magic organized in strands just like wizards.

And what about magical objects? Did they contain traces of the magic of their makers? Could the transfiguration of a teacup, for example, be unraveled just as easily as she had held Snape's magic against him?

But there were magical objects littering all of the rooms in which she had taken the potion and she had never seen a hint that her theory might be true...unless the traces weren't nearly as strong, not nearly as bright as the magic of a wizard…but that didn't mean that they weren't there at all. Maybe the magical residue of the manipulated objects had simply been too dim to notice…

It wasn't something she could find in any book, and for the first time, Hermione Granger veered off the path of precedent and into blind experimentation.

Not until the early light of dawn inched over the horizon did she make her way back to her own room. And by then, she had a plan.

The previous night had been the last of their batch of Devil's Eye. It was just as well; she would need a fresh batch for what she had planned.

A few hours of sleep were adequate. The morning came quickly and she wanted to waste no time. Fortunately, Snape was busy in his role as errand-boy for both masters over the next few days and she was left alone to brew the potion.

Hermione had finished brewing by the time he got a break. The potion had been decanted and divided among seven vials neatly lined up on the counter, waiting for his return.

He crossed the room and picked up a vial, examining it under the light. The contents were not the weak, sickly yellow of the previous batches, but a deep golden hue.

"What is this?" he demanded.

"A more concentrated version of the potion."

"How many pinches of powdered dragon scales did you add?"

"Seven."

He looked up at her sharply.

"Do you have _any_ idea how dangerous this is?"

"Yes."

"If you were to ingest this, it would put you dangerously close to an overdose."

"I know."

He stared at the potion silently for a moment, and then looked up at her again and asked seriously, "Are you trying to kill yourself?"

"No," she answered, but he looked unconvinced. She continued. "Dangerously close is all I want. I think if the potion were stronger, I might be able to see more, like magical residue from spells, more than just magical beings."

His hand was unresisting and she pulled the potion from his grasp. She held the vial to her lips but hesitated, meeting his eyes.

"You know what to do in case I overdose?"

"Hermione," he begged.

"I'm doing this with or without you. If you're here, there's a better chance of me living through it."

The potion was thicker this time as she poured it down her throat. It was sticky and thick and it was hard to breathe as she swallowed.

She staggered and then caught herself against the table as it rushed through her veins with an intensity she could not even have imagined let alone prepared herself for.

Patterns swam before her eyes but it was too bright, too fast, too much.

She tried to concentrate on one pattern, but others flared at the edges of her vision.

Her eyes rolled back in her head and she slumped to the ground. He was over her in a second, shoving something small and hard into her mouth and turning her onto her side as she gagged and vomited.

What followed was a blur of potions being poured down her throat as she fluttered in and out of consciousness.

Finally, she felt herself being levitated to the couch and wrapped in a blanket. Her breathing gradually returned to normal and she slowly opened her eyes. He was standing above her with his face buried in his hands as he furiously shook his head.

"You stupid, stupid girl," he spat.

She pushed herself up into a sitting position, still feeling weak and woozy, but excited.

"I'll lower the dosage a little next time."

His head shot up.

"_Next time?"_

At the look of rage on his face, she knew she could trust him. She knew he would not betray her. That rage was concern. If he was this angry that she would endanger her own life, he would not endanger it himself.

He towered over her as he shouted.

"There isn't going to be a next time. I'm putting an end to this little _experiment_ of yours right now."

His quick strides into the laboratory left her alone and she struggled to catch up. Still weakened from her overdose, she had to brace herself against the table as she walked. She stopped between him and the vials, shielding the potion from his rage with her body.

"Please don't destroy them. There's something here. I know there is. It might be risky, but it's important. There could be something here that might be able to save Harry," she implored, placing her hand on his sleeve and looking into his face with her big brown eyes, begging him to let her continue with her experiments.

He took a step backwards, a look of dawning comprehension on his face.

"Oh sweet Merlin, it's you, isn't it?"

"What? What do you mean?"

"All the rule breaking, all the mischief you three got up to and I always assumed it was the two boys who dragged you along for the ride. But it was _you_. You like the risk."

"It's not that I like it…I just recognize that sometimes important things don't come easily, that sometimes the right path is the most difficult, the most dangerous one."

He sank down onto a stool.

"Is this worth you life?"

"I think it might be."

"Before, you seemed so concerned that I was putting your life in danger."

"It's the difference between risking my life for something I believe in and being someone else's sacrifice. You of all people should understand that."

And he did. While he may not agree with her decision, he would accept it and he would help her. That was all she needed from him.

"After all, you took a calculated risk of your own."

"My deal with the Devil," he mused with a dark look.

"You mean you're not the Devil?" she replied blithely, not really expecting a reply.

"No, just the serpent."

She looked up at him.

"And that would, of course, make me Eve?"

"Yes."

She blinked.

"You know, I never really understood that story. I mean, even with all the bad stuff it brought with it…I could never understand turning away knowledge. Who would want to live in blissful ignorance? I can imagine nothing worse."

He let out a long, defeated sigh.

"Let me try the potion again."

His short laugh was followed by him shaking his head slowly in defeat.

"Later. You're weak, you should rest."

It was true. She was lightheaded and wobbly. The overdose had taken a lot out of her and if the next trial was anything like this last one, she would need all her strength before they tried again.

X

X

"How do you feel?" he asked tentatively, lines of concern creasing his face.

She took a deep breath and braced herself against the overpowering sensation of the potion. They had waited two days for her physical and magical strength to fully recover before he had deemed it safe to perform the next trial.

"I'm okay. It's not as bad as last time."

Nevertheless, he eyed her skeptically.

"You look like you're going to fall over."

Her knuckles were white as she gripped the tabletop for balance.

"No. I'm fine. I just need a minute."

She focused on her breathing and let the initial rush of the potion pass. Finally, she looked up at him and gave him what she hoped was a reassuring nod. He relaxed slightly and took his hand out of the pocket where she knew he had been fingering a bezoar.

"What do you see?"

"I can see the traces of magic on objects. They're like faint strands, mostly static or shifting slowly, not like a living being's magic."

X

She made a slow circuit of the room, trailing her fingertips along various objects, her attention shifting and lingering from object to object. Finally, she stopped in front of his desk and placed the flat of her palm against his top left drawer.

"This drawer is warded," she whispered.

"Yes."

Her eyes slipped shut as she stood silently concentrating. The effects of the potion on her were obvious. Strands of hair stuck to the perspiration of her flushed face, her pupils were so wide that there was only a thin ring of brown visible beneath the overwhelming black. He could do nothing but watch her.

The drawer slid open.

Her lips cracked into a triumphant smile as she surveyed the contents of the drawer and pulled out his grade book, dropping it onto the desk with a soft thud.

She rounded the desk, her breathing becoming quicker in her excitement.

"That quill, it isn't really a quill, is it?"

"No."

Her head quirked to the side.

"It was transfigured…but not by you?"

He stepped closer to her, unable to contain his curiosity.

"How do you know?"

"The traces of magic on it…they're not like on the drawer. They're not yours."

"Minerva made it for me."

"Can I turn it back?"

"Yes."

He watched as her hand hovered over the quill. She focused on it intently, her eyes darting back and forth. and suddenly the heavy black quill was gone and in its place was a surprisingly Muggle yellow #2 pencil.

"Minerva refused to use anything but a quill."

Her eyes turned to him with all the intensity that had been directed towards the quill.

"This is incredible."

He had not known, those months ago when he first handed her the first Dark Arts text that she would be venturing into magic for which he could offer no explanation. He had expected to teach her, to guide her, not simply to offer her a door into the unknown.

There was a dangerous shine in her eyes as she approached him.

"I can do anything."

It was the potion talking, but he couldn't help being attracted to her like this, confident and powerful.

Her tongue darted out to moisten her lips and he couldn't tear his gaze away.

How had he ever thought that he could use her as a pawn? He had thought that he could manipulate her into playing his game, but he had the distinct feeling that she who was moving the pieces.

She was lovely like this, flushed and predatory.

He knew how heightened the senses were while taking Devil's Eye and he could only imagine what she must be feeling with the more concentrated version, how much every sight, every sound would affect her.

He would fight this. He would not take advantage. He would not do any more harm to her than he already had.

She was very close to him now.

He held his breath as she reached out a single finger and trailed it down the row of buttons on his chest.

"Why are we fighting this?"

And he knew there was an answer to her question, that there must be a very good answer, but at the moment, he had no response.

She reached up and fisted his hair, lowering his head and pressing her lips against his.

Just this. Just the kiss and no more, he told himself. It was nothing they hadn't done already.

He pushed her up against the wall, remembering the feel of her around his finger.

He moved his lips against hers, reveling in their warmth, in the taste of the forbidden. His tongue stroked hers. Just this. Just this and no more. His hand traitorously slipped down her hip and over her thigh, pulling her closer to him in the process, holding her close against his aching erection.

Just this and no more.

She rubbed herself against it.

And for a moment, time stopped. He froze, torn between his desires and his better intentions. How could he do this to her? How could he take advantage of her like this?

And as always, his better nature was outmatched. After all he'd put her through, he reasoned, he owed her this…didn't he? It was a weak excuse, but he'd use it.

He turned her in his arms until her back was against his chest. Her arm snaked around his neck and grabbed his hair as he lowered his lips to her neck.

His hand slid lower and lower against her smooth stomach. And lower still, slipping under the waistband of her skirt, under the elastic of her knickers.

He found her clit and circled it before pulling her backwards with him until he was seated on the sofa with her in his lap. One hand still down her skirt, he slipped the other under the thin fabric of her blouse, seeking out the soft flesh of her breast. She squirmed against him, rubbing her bum against his erection in the process.

His fingers circled her opening, skimming the moisture and teasing her. The other hand tweaked her nipple. She turned her head to look at him over her shoulder and he captured her lips in a needy kiss, thrusting his tongue into her mouth, skimming it along the sharp edges of her teeth and her own slippery tongue.

He had dreamed of this moment, had used it as fuel for dirty fantasies behind closed doors.

He slipped a single finger into her as he had done before. He paused, but this time no knock sounded at the door. There was nothing but his pounding heartbeat, her erratic breathing, and the sinfully wet tightness enveloping his finger. She moaned as he drew it out of her slowly. He pressed it in again, further this time. And out and then back in. She started moving against him, urging him to go faster and he complied.

He added another finger to the first, stretching her wider as he pumped in and out of her. She hooked her feet around his calves and he widened his stance, causing her legs to open wider. Although she was still fully clothed, she looked utterly debauched. Her skirt was pushed up on her thighs as his skillful fingers moved underneath, causing a loud wet sound that seemed to echo around them.

"You like this?" he whispered in her ear, even though he already knew the answer.

"Yes," she moaned and then repeated.

"'Unhhhhh. Ohh yes."

He thrust his erection against her backside in time with the motion of his fingers. Finally, she threw her head back against his shoulder as her eyes slipped shut and he felt her come undone around him, clenching and squeezing his fingers as the climaxed.

The pressure on his cock, the smell of her arousal, the sticky moisture coating his fingers, it was all too much for him and he felt his own release soak his pants.

It was been too long since he had fucked and he had been fantasizing about her so often.

She rested against him as her breathing slowed, his finger still traced circles on the sticky skin of her inner thigh.

"It's getting late. You should go."

x

The potion had mostly worn off, leaving her with only a lazy hum streaming through her veins. She smiled as she let herself drift back to the memory of his fingers inside her. A sudden jerk brought her harshly back to reality. She didn't even need to look up from the purple robes to identify the wizard she had just rammed into as she turned the corner.

"S-sorry Headmaster," she stuttered as she tried to straighten her skirt. It was a lost cause. Her appearance left no doubt as to what she had been doing down in the dungeons and her cheeks flushed red with shame.

It was nothing he hadn't already believed to be happening, she reminded herself.

"Miss Granger," he greeted her tightly, disapproval evident in his frown.

She had been more at ease with lying to him than with telling the truth.

x

x

Severus fastened the manacle around her wrist, muttering a charm to secure it to the wall and then dropped his arm along her body, allowing his finger to lightly caress the side of her breast.

She shivered at his touch and he leaned in and whispered in her ear, "Maybe we'll have to do this again sometime."

Their experiments had gotten more and more intensive, testing the limits of what Hermione could do under the influence of the potion.

He stepped away from her, eying her with a challenging smirk.

"Alright Houdini."

"Houdini?" She raised an eyebrow, surprised at the reference.

"I told you my father was a Muggle."

And then she was alone, chained to the wall of the dungeon, held there under layers and layers of wards. And once again, in a split-moment of uncertainty, she wondered what she had gotten herself into.

She closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the stone wall, giving herself over to the potion, feeling the patterns that swam through and around her. She felt the cool metal pull at her wrists and concentrated on the magic that held if there..._his_ magic. It was familiar to her by now, the pattern and weave of his spells. Sure, they varied by spell, but there was a style that was uniquely his.

And her thoughts drifted to where he waited for her, past warded doors and spelled passageways. Somewhere in the dungeons, he waited. The thought aroused her terribly.

The metals cuffs fell loudly to the floor and she crossed the room to start on the door. His wards wove themselves in intricate patterns as she struggled to unravel them.

The door swung open and she took a deep breath before she started on the next, trying to calm herself and focus despite her anxiety to get through the challenges he had set for her. He was aware of her heightened sensitivity while on the potion and would reward her achievements by fingering her until she orgasmed. She was careful not to make these encounters into anything other than they were. They were dirty and intense, but she wasn't so naive as to think that they meant anything.

The thought of his cock popped into her head and her concentration broke, forcing her to start over. All their encounters so far had been about her. Sure, she had felt it straining through the taut cloth of his trousers, had rubbed against it, but she still had yet to see it. Tonight that would change. She imagined herself taking him into her mouth and...she needed to focus if she was ever going to get out of there.

Finally the last set of wards dropped and the door swung open to reveal the dark Potions Master leaning against the wall, his arms crossed across his chest.

She smirked at him from across the corridor, wordlessly casting a spell that released her hair from its binds and let it fall across her shoulder.

"You have beautiful spellwork."

He remained motionless as she approached him, kneeling before him with a wicked smile on her face.

He looked down at her as his lips tilted up laviciously

"You naughty little witch."

"I want to suck you," she replied, stroking her hand down the front of his pants, as if he had had any doubt as to what she meant.

"I want to make you come in my mouth."

She could feel him growing hard at her words.

Yes, he wanted it.

The potion spun circles in her mind. Touching him sparked sensations that tripped and sparked her nerve endings. All she had thought about as she had dismantled spell after spell in the dungeon cell was how it would feel to put his cock in her mouth, to give him pleasure, to make him lose control.

He stared at her with heat in his eyes as she unbuttoned his trousers and slowly lowered the zipper.

She circled the tip with her tongue, darting her gaze upwards for a moment to see his eyes slip halfway shut.

It was a sense of power that rivaled being able to take down his wards without a wand.

Grabbing it firmly, she took him deeper, willing her throat to relax as he head of his cock pushed against it. She held him there for a moment, increasing the pressure around him until he groaned.

That low groan set her on fire and her own hand slid beneath her skirt.

She looked up to find him watching her.

"Yes," he growled, "touch yourself while you suck me."

And she did, plunging two fingers in and out of her wet folds while he thrust his cock in and out of her mouth, his hand fisted possessively in her hair as she moaned around him.

He tensed for a second and she knew he was going to come, prepared herself for the hot, salty stream hitting the back of her throat and greedily swallowed his ejaculation, sucking forcefully as he groaned.

She let his softening member slide out of her mouth as her own orgasm took her. He slid down the wall until he was sprawled, panting on the floor. She soon joined him, collapsed against the wall, letting the hardness of the stones bring her back to reality.

Sweat glistened on his neck, even in the cool dungeon air. They lay there sweaty and sated in the darkness. She felt the potion's effect slowly wearing off, leaving her cold but clearer.

She stared straight ahead into nothing, trying to gather her thoughts.

"I feel as if there is something I am missing. As if I have all the pieces, but I just can't quite figure out how they go together."

Her gaze found his.

"I don't know what it all means."

He stood slowly, tucking himself back in and buttoning his trousers.

"There is someone who might."

He turned before she could even ask who.

"Meet me at the front gate at four tomorrow afternoon. We need to act quickly. The students will be returning in two days. We need a plan by then."

x

x

* * *

_A/n: Sorry for the long wait!!! Things got really busy and I was also stuck on this chapter for a while. It was a difficult one for me to write, but never fear, more chapters are coming._ Thanks for sticking with me. Your reviews are great. Keep them coming!


	15. Spinner's End

Chapter 15: Spinner's End

The professor met her at the gate at four, clad in his heavy traveling cloak. Hermione had intended to ask where they were going, but was yanked into a dizzying side-along apparition before she got the chance to so much as open her mouth.

Whatever she had expected, it was something more impressive than the dank alleyway where she now found herself standing. Snape quickly stepped out of the alley and she followed. His eyes darted back and forth, surveying the eerie stillness, but there was no need; there was not another living thing in sight. The street they had entered was narrow and straight, containing row after row of identical brick houses. Many were boarded up and abandoned, lending a run-down feel to the entire scene.

"Where are we?" she breathed.

"This is where I grew up," he answered. "This is Spinner's End."

"Lily Evans grew up here?" she asked, wrinkling her nose at the pungent odors.

"No," he answered tersely. "Her family lived on the other side of town."

The good side, evidently, because despite her considerable imagination, at the moment she couldn't imagine a part of town that would be worse than this.

He opened the door to one of the row houses, securing it firmly behind them once she was inside. She noted that he had used a security spell even though the door contained a Muggle lock. The house was a strange mix of Muggle and magical, not quite seeming to fit into either world. Despite the general sense of gloominess in the interior, the juxtaposition of quill and telephone, of broomstick and television, the stone pensive sitting on the same small side table as an electrical lamp, all made her feel strangely at home in a way that the monoculture of the Burrow never had.

He disappeared up the stairs, leaving her to study the wizarding portraits in the drawing room while she waited for him. The portraits scowled at her, following her movements with their dark eyes, but not one attempted to speak to her.

She made her way slowly around the room, studying each one, fascinated with this rare look into her…her what? Her professor? That specific relationship was only a formality, a cover at this point. Her mentor? Her lover?

Surveying the portraits one-by-one, she had made it most of the way around the room, through several generations of the Prince family (which she assumed was his mother's side). Continuing, she stopped at a rather sullen looking woman. The placard of the frame identified her as Constance Elizabeth Snape.

Hermione stopped, trying to identify what seemed out of place, when his voice sounded behind her, signaling his return.

"Enjoying the Snape family history?"

She turned to him slowly, finally realizing what had seemed off.

"But you're…you're a halfblood. Aren't you?"

"My father was a Muggle, if that's what you're asking."

"And you're a half-blood."

"Hardly. The Death Eaters aren't stupid enough just to take you at your word on your blood status. I am a pureblood."

"But you just said your father was a Muggle."

"And what are the requirements to be considered a pureblood?"

"One must have four magical grandparents," she recited.

He waited for the moment of realization.

"Tobias Snape wasn't just a Muggle…he was also a Squib."

He looked away from her, seemingly uncomfortable with the topic at hand. She knew she should drop it, but his admission had hinted at a deeper story, one that would illuminate his usually obscured past.

"He couldn't do magic?" she asked inanely. Of course he couldn't, that was the definition of a Squib. But instead of the biting smear on her intellect that she braced herself for, he answered seriously and softly.

"He hated magic. He hated my mother for being a witch. He hated me for being born with the gift that had been denied to him."

Shaking his head as it to clear it, he left the room, pulling back on his traveling cloak in the corridor. They were leaving and this moment would not happen again. She wanted to get the full story before she missed her chance.

"Did she know?" she asked, stopping him suddenly in the middle of buttoning his cloak. He looked up at her.

"Know what?"

"Did she know that your father wasn't simply a Muggle?"

"Yes. The Prince family was an old pureblood family with a respectable name but not a lot of money. My mother wasn't pretty enough to attract any of the pureblood boys she knew from school. She knew of wealth of the Snape family, had heard rumors of a Squib son who had been sent to live among the Muggles. She managed to ensnare him, convincing him she was in love with him. Well, he married her and to her dismay never saw a knut of his family's wealth. So she ended up wed to a mere mill worker. And he despised her for bringing the world that had cast him out back into his life. He was even angrier when I was born."

And with that, he ushered her out of the dark hallway and back out onto the street. She struggled to keep up with his long strides.

"What are we doing at Spinner's End?" she asked, unable to contain her curiosity any longer.

"We are going to see the Spinner."

"Is she a witch?"

He fixed her with a look that she didn't know how to interpret.

"Of course."

At the end of the street, the houses stopped and the paved road became a dirt path that twisted and turned until it disappeared over the hill and into the forest.

They followed the path up the slope, the layout of the town becoming clearer as they reached the peak. A river meandered next to the road, full of garbage and stench. This was not a pristine nature, but one that had been stripped bare and abused in the rush for industrialization. It was a cold, visceral shock after the untouched beauty of the grounds of Hogwarts.

Hermione looked ahead to the forest, hoping to find just a small piece of undisturbed nature inside. The forest was dark, full of tightly-spaced trees that blotted out the light. It seemed peaceful enough, but, she realized with an uneasy feeling in her stomach, eerily devoid of animals. They entered the forest, picking their way through in the dim light as their eyes adjusted to the darkness. Hermione's heart beat faster and the hairs on the back of her neck stood on edge. There was a light ahead, though she could not make out its source. A strange, soft hum pierced her ears and she moved closer to Snape. Something was not right here.

As they continued on, the light grew closer and the hum became louder and louder. Finally they entered a clearing where a tiny house sat, set back from the edge of the ring of trees. This structure was undoubtedly the source of both the light and the persistent hum that they had been following through the forest.

So this was where the Spinner lived.

The house was surprisingly ordinary and unremarkable. It was built of bare boards, old and weathered. It seemed to be from an earlier era than the mill town that had been built nearby. As they entered, Hermione's eyes were drawn to a carving above the doorway, the only decoration on the barren structure. In the carving, a female clad in Greek robes that even in the relief seemed thin and diaphanous, stretched out her arm. In her grasp, a spindle. Hermione's mind searched back through the myths she had read in her childhood and supplied a name, _Clotho_.

The door opened at Snape's touch and she quickly found herself in the midst of whirring, clacking machines, between strands that zipped through the air faster than she could watch.

What had she expected? A little old lady in the center of a bare room with her hand-powered wooden spinning wheel?

A woman, the Spinner, emerged from the midst of the chaos. She was old, maybe older than Dumbledore even. If she was not, then life had been harsher to her.

"Severus," the hag smiled, and Hermione flinched at the sight of her yellowed and missing teeth, "It has been a long time."

"It has," he conceded evenly, giving no hint as to what his relationship to this woman had previously been. Hermione felt unaccountably nervous as the old woman's eyes swept over her.

"And you have brought a friend."

"This is Hermione Granger."

"Why are you here?" the woman asked without preamble. Her question was direction towards Hermione and she struggled to find an answer.

"I...we...have been experimenting with the Devil's Eye Potion," she began. If Snape had brought her here, it must be because this woman had answers. He made no move to halt her confession. "In the strands...I can see patterns. I can touch them, unravel them, control them."

The old woman studied her intently, as if seeking some knowledge.

"So, you have seen the patterns and structures of magic?"

"Yes."

Hermione breathed a sigh of relief. The woman understood. She opened her mouth to ask a question, but the hag's expression grew cold and closed.

"If you can see the strands, if you can control them, then you have wasted your time coming to me." The woman turned as if to return to her work, but Hermione wasn't going to let her go that easily.

"But…But what does it all mean?"

The old woman looked up and studied her for a moment.

"That is a dangerous question. Are you sure you wish to ask it?"

"I am."

"What would happen, if someone were to take your magic away?"

Hermione considered the question for a moment before she answered.

"Well, I suppose I would be the same, I just wouldn't have magic. I would be a Muggle."

The old hag let out a loud cackle.

"A Muggle?" she screeched, obviously very entertained at the thought.

"Yes!"

"Let me guess. You're Muggle-born."

"I am," Hermione replied indignantly, her eyes flashing to Snape, suddenly unsure of what this woman's affiliations might be.

"That's the problem with you Muggle-borns. You grow up with this idea of your _self_," she sneered at the word, "then when you learn you are a witch, you see your magic as a separate thing, a supplemental part of you."

"And it's not?"

"No."

The woman waited a moment.

"Have you ever seen a Dementor's kiss?"

"I haven't seen one completed," she said, thinking of Sirius, "but I have been a witness to the process."

"Well, then you have some idea of what I am speaking."

The hag rounded the machine and Hermione followed her, struggling to catch up.

"But…but that's not removing the magic; it's removing the soul."

The hag stopped turned, staring at her silently for a long moment, as if waiting for her to come to some realization. Finally, the hag whispered.

"There. Is. No. Difference."

Hermione was speechless for a moment and it felt as if her whole world had tilted on its axis. This changed everything. How could she have been so stupid? How could she have not realized? All the signs were there and she had never put the pieces together. She looked up searching and through the whizzing fibers, her eyes met Severus' across the room. He understood too.

The sun had begun to set while they had been inside the Spinner's house. They walked briskly down the road in the dying light of the late afternoon.

"Do you understand the implications…what this might mean?"

He glanced around.

"Not here," he hissed. "Not until we're inside."

He shut the door behind them and they stood in the dark foyer, both breathing heavily from the brisk walk back.

"How could I never have seen it? The fact that Harry has some of Voldemort's powers…the Parseltongue…of course he doesn't just have a piece of his soul…a person's soul and magic are inseparable." The hag was right, she had always thought of herself as fundamentally the same as Muggles, but with the added gift of magic. She might look like a Muggle on the outside, but her soul was fundamentally different to those of her parents and neighbors. Magic was soul and soul was magic. A dangerous piece of knowledge, one that had the power to bring down their world.

She turned to see Severus beside her, his head leaning back against the wall, the sounds of their breathing loud in the dark silence.

"This changes everything." She was still reeling from the implications of it.

"If I could separate the strands that are Harry's soul from the strands that belong to Voldemort…if we could remove them…"

She stood there in the darkness, letting the truth sink in. She had seen her own soul. And she had seen _his_, had touched it even. It made goosebumps rise on her arm.

He left her in the foyer alone, making his way further into the darkness of the house.

"This changes everything," she whispered to herself.

She found him in the kitchen, sitting alone at the table beside the window. He had neither food nor drink, but stared absently out the dirty glass, seemingly lost in thought.

This house was cold, lonely. But there was something about the emptiness or the stillness that seemed to fit her mood. It was something she knew she wouldn't find at Hogwarts. The hag's revelations had rearranged her world and she wasn't ready to face Hogwarts just yet.

"Can we stay here tonight?" she asked, aware of her presumptuousness in inviting herself to stay, but she needed some time.

He looked over to her slowly, with a faint surprise as if he hadn't heard her enter the room.

"If you wish."

"Too much has changed. I just can't deal with Hogwarts tonight."

She followed him up the stairs and into a cramped, dark corridor.

He pushed open a door, revealing a dusty, bare room with a bed pushed up against the far wall. It looked as if no one had entered this room in at least a decade. The bone-deep ache of loneliness pervaded every crack and corner of this place.

"You can sleep in here," he said coldly, standing across the room from her.

_I've touched his soul. _The thought flashed in her mind unbidden. Despite his cold manner, his distance, his severe robes, his scowl, she had touched his soul.

She watched in silence as he pulled blankets and linnens from the small closet and made up the bed up for her.

She had thought of their heated enounters as meaningless interactions, had thought only of the deep, probing strength of his fingers, had thought only of his hot tongue snaking between her lips, had thought only of his magic against hers as an erotic thrill. But it hadn't just been his magic, it had been his soul that she had seen, had touched, had held in her grasp. And that changed everything.

He tossed a spare sheet on top of the blankets and she watched as it fluttered down slowly.

"You are skilled enough at Transfiguration to make yourself something to wear to sleep."

And with that, she was alone.

x

x

He sat down on the edge of his bed and rested his face in his hands. He felt empty. And

A hint of black peeked through the unbuttoned cuff of his sleeve.

Soul and magic, magic and soul. It was one and the same. How could he never have put that together?

They had dueled and teased and fooled around in the dungeons. It had been rough and dirty and exhilarating. But now, knowing that they had brushed souls, that she had held his soul in her grasp, he wasn't sure what to make of it.

He felt tired and old and broken.

The door opened and he looked up, seeing the woman framed by the doorway.

She had taken his directive to transfigure herself something to wear, but what she had created was far more revealing that he had expected. Slender straps met behind her neck, holding up thin, gauzy white material that left very little to the imagination.

"What are you doing in here, Hermione?"

She approached him, not stopping until she was standing between his legs. Her delicate fingers skimmed his cheek.

"I thought it should be fairly obvious what I'm doing here."

It was the first time she had touched him without being under the effects of the potion. He stood, causing her to take a step backwards.

"We can't just…" It wouldn't be like the other times, like the quick, dirty encounters in the dungeons.

"I know," she replied softly. There was no casual sex between people who had brushed souls.

He looked to the side of the room, refusing to meet her eyes.

"I can't."

x

x

* * *

A/N: Ok, less than a month, at least that was better than my lag for the previous update. I'm getting faster, right? Stay with me, I'm getting there! Your reviews help me get there faster.


	16. Confession

Chapter 16: Confession

"_I can't."_

He had crossed too many lines with her. It was one thing to indulge in forbidden touches in the darkest corners of Hogwarts, but this...

She stood a few steps away from him in the darkened room. He was acutely aware of her presence, her magic, her body.

"I've already taken your innocence in too many ways," he murmured, staring off into the darkness.

He couldn't see her, but was aware that she was watching him and he felt uneasy under her scrutiny.

"I'm not a virgin, if that's what you're implying."

He looked at her finally. Even in the dim glow of the moonlight seeping in through the dirty windowpanes, her thin nightgown was shear. The fabric hid little, hinting at the dark circles of her nipples beneath the place where the material strained over them. It was tempting.

"No?"

"No, I had sex with Viktor two years ago."

"I never realized that you and Krum were a couple."

It was her turn to look uncomfortable now.

"We weren't. I mean, I wasn't in love with him or anything. I was just…"

"Curious," he finished for her with a resigned sigh. "Of course." His hand rose to pinch the bridge of his nose. This girl...this woman…

She stepped closer.

"I just wanted to know what it felt like."

He dropped his hand and looked at her.

"And how did it feel?"

"Awkward, but kind of nice."

Although he couldn't see it in the darkness, he would have bet anything he owned that she was blushing.

"Hermione, if I…if we did this, it wouldn't be any of the innocent fumblings of adolescence."

"I know."

He opened his mouth to respond, but before he got any words out, she repeated, "I know."

She stepped closer to him as he tried to hold her off with his words.

"Hermione, I am a..."

"I know."

And closer.

"I have done things that…"

"I know."

He had never done well against temptation.

Her hand crept up his neck and cradled the back of his head. She pulled, forcing his face down to where she could reach it.

x

It was proper etiquette, someone had once told her, to keep your eyes closed when you kissed. But she kept them open now and so did he, staring directly into the depths of hers as their lips met, maintaining eye contact even as his tongue slowly stroked hers.

She wanted him, wanted him in a way that she had never wanted anything. Logically, there was no denying that this was a bad idea. But she needed it. After the startling revelations of the day, everything she thought she knew had been flipped around and somehow, his presence, the warmth of his solid body against hers, seemed to be the only thing that could set it right.

She pressed herself against him, letting him feel her curves. She didn't need the potion anymore for the sort of reckless confidence necessary to tempt him like this.

And suddenly he was turning her, pressing her down onto the rough sheets of his small bed.

She wrapped her legs around him, arching her body up against his clothed erection.

She reached for his lips again, pulling away only long enough to murmur.

"Fuck me, Severus."

He lifted himself up, standing next to the bed as the slowly peeled off layer after layer of his clothing. She pulled her nightgown up over her head and let it join his discarded items on the floor.

And then he was over her again, skin against skin as his weight pressed down on her and his lips found hers.

He entered her slowly, as if savoring every inch. Her body adjusted to the intrusion, stretching around him as she gasped. A moment of stillness, of pure sensation, and then he began to move, filling her with a solidness she could cling to against the mercurial world.

She had touched his soul before and she reached for it now, knowing the shape and feel of it. Her magic brushed against it and he groaned in pleasure, thrusting into her in long, sensual strokes. She could feel his soul, more deeply and concretely than before now that they were already joined. It was more than just a brush of magic against her skin.

Her magic skimmed every inch of his soul, exploring the forbidden territory where none had dared to venture. She could feel the spots where it was worn and broken, the dark voids and raw fractures.

He was right; this was not sex as she had ever experienced it before. The intensity and focus with which he fucked her took her breath away. He kept up the relentless pace, driving into her until she screamed his name, until she felt his release seep out of her, hot and sticky on her thighs.

x

x

In the early morning light that came in through the cracked kitchen window, he studied the photograph. The edges were tattered and the color faded, a Muggle photograph that had not aged well over the last twenty-some years. But the girl in the photograph was just as beautiful as ever. It was a beauty that defied all time and logic.

The sound of the door opening startled him out of his reverie and he quickly threw the photograph into a drawer and slammed it shut. It seemed, however that he had not been quick enough and that she had caught the flash of red that had given him away.

He simply stared, waiting for the explosion. He knew that the last thing a witch wanted to see after a night of sex was the wizard studying a photograph of the woman he loved.

The rage he was bracing himself for did not come. Instead, she studied him calmly from across the room.

"You're not in love with her."

"What did you say?"

"I said you're not in love with her. At least not anymore."

He had expected her to be the one to lose her temper, not him.

"How dare you…"

"If you were still in love with her, you wouldn't have touched me, not like that."

She turned her back to him to pour herself a cup of tea as he fumed.

"Sex is not the same thing as love."

"I know that. And sure, sex can happen independently of love, but in the face of real love, of absolute devotion, could you really stand to touch another woman? Would you even want to feel the heat of another's flesh? Wouldn't you feel the shame of betrayal?"

"That's ridiculous," he scoffed derisively, but he knew it was true. When Lily was alive, he had fucked plenty of women, but he always, always felt as though he was betraying her. The voice in the back of his mind that had always insisted she had never been his to betray had been routinely ignored. He had always felt as though he was betraying his love for her. After her death, he had stopped sleeping with women altogether, as a form of repentance, as proof of the purity of his love. He had never realized it, had never thought of it in these terms, but at some point the memory of her had faded enough for him to seek out female companionship once again.

"There are plenty of men who would find it impossible to resist sexual attention from an eighteen-year-old woman even though their heart belonged to another."

She stepped closer to him.

"Plenty of men, yes. Men who love halfheartedly, men who love weakly, but not a man who loves with the devotion capable of selling out the entire magical world for one life."

And closer.

"Not you."

He couldn't bring himself to deny it.

"I could see your eyes while you were fucking me…and there was no shame, no guilt. You don't love her. Not anymore."

x

x

Walking through the crowded corridors of Hogwarts once again, it occurred to her that she had never felt less like she belonged there. Sure, her initial transition into the magical world had not been a smooth one, and sure she had been put through her share of name-calling (both by enemies and by friends), but never had she felt more out of place in the mass of students filling the building. She was not one of them anymore. They chattered about exams and teenage romances. She would sit through her classes and pretend that she cared, but it was really only a cover at this point. She was not here to learn, she was here to find a way to destroy Voldemort and save Harry's soul.

Entering Gryffindor common room, she was confronted with the sight of Harry, Ginny, and Ron sitting together talking animatedly. So Christmas at the Burrow had apparently gone well.

Unsure of her welcome in the group, Hermione politely chatted with Neville until Ron and Ginny had left the room and she could get a minute with Harry alone.

"So you and Ron are friends again?"

"Yeah. I told him you dumped me."

He looked at her sheepishly, as if expecting her to be angry. She gave him a light punch of his shoulder and smiled at him.

"I'm such a bitch, breaking your heart like that."

He chuckled quietly.

"Sorry."

"Don't worry about it. I'm glad you and Ron are friends again."

An awkward silence stretched between them, neither one sure of how to breach the topic.

"We need to talk, Hermione."

"I know."

"Meet me in our usual spot after lunch."

x

x

The rain poured down against the windowpanes, darkening the sky. And despite the fact that it was barely past one in the afternoon, the room was cloaked in somber grey light more akin to dusk.

As Harry entered the classroom, his eyes immediately scanned his surroundings, passing his friend quickly and then settling on the dark figure who stood in the corner, partially obscured by the darkness. His gaze hardened and his mouth tightened.

"What is _he_ doing here?"

She took a deep breath and launched in.

"The Dark Arts that I have been passing along to you…Severus has been teaching them to me."

"Severus?" Harry asked darkly, but she continued with determination.

"He has been trying to help us."

She knew that her futile insistence would get her nowhere against Harry's explosive temper.

"Like hell he has. You've been lying to me."

Her only hope of getting him to listen was to just come out and say it, to shock him into listening.

"Harry, I know about Horcruxes."

He paused for a moment simply staring at her and then responded cautiously.

"You do?"

She held his intense stare.

"Yes."

She had his attention.

"And Dumbledore…" she glanced quickly up at Severus, "Dumbledore hasn't told you everything."

"What do you mean?"

"There is a seventh Horcrux, one that Voldemort created unintentionally."

"That doesn't make sense. Why would Dumbledore not tell me?"

After all the blows that life had dealt him, he did not deserve this. She hated to be the one to cause him this pain.

"The seventh Horcrux is _you_."

He closed his eyes in defeat.

"That is my connection to Voldemort, isn't it? I have a piece of him inside of me."

"Yes."

"So I….I need to be destroyed as well…like all the rest of them."

"That is what Dumbledore believes."

"And what do you believe?"

"I believe that under the effects of the yellow potion, I might be able to separate the piece of his soul from yours."

Harry studied her cautiously for a few moments.

"That sounds dangerous."

Snape cut in.

"It is. Any sort of manipulation of the soul carries with it serious risks. Horcruxes contain some of the most dangerous magic."

She knew Harry, could predict what he would say even before the words left his mouth.

"Then maybe it's better if we don't…maybe it's better…safer for everyone for me to die."

"Harry," she reached over to pull him tightly to her. "Harry, don't say that."

"Potter," Snape spoke and both students snapped their heads up to look at him. "Potter, these are not risks that we haven't carefully weighed and measured. These are not risks that Miss Granger and myself are not prepared to take."

Hermione nodded.

Harry cleared his throat and stepped away from her, shifting his gaze from one to the other.

"So how do we do this?"

"Take off your shirt. Skin-to-skin contact will strengthen the connection."

Severus pulled a vial out of his robes and handed it to Hermione who downed it in one gulp. She closed her eyes, leaning her head back to rest on the back of the tall chair in which she sat while the potion began to take effect.

"Does_ he_ need to be here for this?"

"Yes," she replied without opening her eyes.

Harry removed his collared shirt, placing it in his lap. She reached out, placing her hand on his bare chest above his heart, feeling it beat under her fingertips.

Severus tensed behind her, but did not comment.

She lost herself in the strands, in their seductive glow and pulse. She lost herself in the intricacies and patterns and she picked apart his magic, his soul. Her focus was not on the general pattern, but on the small differences, on the pieces that didn't quite fit with the rest.

"I see them," she gasped, trying not to lose her focus, "they pulse at a slightly different rate."

"Separate them from the others," his harsh voice commanded from behind her.

Harry groaned in pain, fingernails digging in to the soft wood of the chair seat.

"Sever them."

Harry's eyes rolled back in his head as she grasped his soul with her magic and tried to tear it apart. After a few moments, Hermione was pale and sweating.

"I can't do it."

"Try harder."

"They won't come apart."

She knew it had been a long shot to begin with, but that did nothing to lessen the sharp sting of failure.

"Can you weaken the bonds?"

"Yes, but I can't break them."

"Weaken them as much as you can."

She second she released him, Harry fell to the floor on his hands and knees and vomited.

Severus silently vanished it as she was too depleted to even summon a small amount of magic. Harry lay on the floor taking long, deep gulps of air.

Finally he recovered and pulled himself up to his knees.

"What happened?" he asked, still visibly trembling.

"I was able to weaken the bonds between your soul and the piece of Voldemort's…but I…I couldn't completely break the bond."

"I…I don't understand. What does that mean?"

Her voice was raw and rough.

"Harry, you have to commit a murder."

Hadn't this always been the plan? Hadn't he always intended to kill Voldemort?

Somehow hearing it put in these terms made it sound different.

"When you split your soul, it will break along the weak points…around the piece of Voldemort's soul. If we can capture this piece, we can transfer it to an object…something we can destroy…"

Harry looked up at her in horror.

"You're talking about creating a Horcrux."

She forced herself, with every ounce of strength that she had left, to hold his gaze.

"I am."


	17. Seeking

Chapter 17: Seeking

x

x

There. She had said it out loud. She had suggested the ultimate taboo, had gone where only the darkest wizards in history had ever dared to go.

A chill prickled slowly up her spine.

In the silence, Harry and Severus stared at her with identical expressions of horror.

In a different situation, it might have been funny.

She had shocked them, but they would get over it. It was the only way. For Harry to live and Voldemort to die, there was no other solution. Harry has a piece of Voldemort's soul inside of him and unless they could get it out, killing Voldemort would make it necessary to kill Harry too. She wouldn't let that happen. He was her best friend and she wouldn't watch him die.

Harry had to make a Horcrux.

Severus obviously wasn't opposed to using less-than-orthodox methods when it suited him. And Harry...Harry always drew his own lines. Still, this was some _very_ dark magic that she was suggesting.

Hermione tried not to flinch under the weight of their collective gaze.

The three of them sat in silence, absorbing the full magnitude of what she was suggesting. It was an unlikely alliance, but she knew it could work. It simply had to.

Finally, she took a deep breath and looked up at Severus.

"What do you know about creating a Horcrux?"

His mouth opened and then closed and then opened again. He stared at her for a long moment before he answered.

"Practically nothing." He let out a deep breath and continued. "Dumbledore has sought to keep any mention of them from the Hogwarts library and the Dark Lord has destroyed references to them elsewhere so that no one else would follow in his footsteps."

"We need another source then, one who would have had access to this literature or one who would have had this knowledge passed to them. We need someone who knows how to make a Horcrux."

The rain pounded harder against the window.

"This is insane," Harry murmured.

No one disagreed.

x

x

Dinner was a tense affair. Severus watched from across the room as Hermione picked at her food. Next to her, Potter seemed poised to catch her at any moment were she to suddenly collapse. By the look of her, he could not blame the boy.

The experiments had taken a toll on her. She looked exhausted, disturbed. The afternoon's experiment on Potter had obviously left her weak and unsteady. She pushed the food around on her plate, evidently not able to stomach the rich fare. She had pushed herself too hard, too fast. He had told her time and time again, but she didn't listen. Each new discovery she seemed to count as a validation of her efforts, taking no notice of the physical and mental cost to herself.

And now she wanted them to make a Horcrux.

It was only when Dumbledore's voice sounded beside him that he realized he had been openly staring at her.

"Severus, follow me to my office."

Once the door had been shut, the old man wasted no time.

"What are you doing to her, Severus?"

He forced his expression into a mocking sneer.

"I thought I had already made that clear."

The Headmaster looked at him imploringly.

"For Merlin's sake, Severus. She looks terrible. A sexual relationship with a student is…is bad enough, but whatever you're doing to her is beyond that. I don't…I don't even want to know. I just beg you. I beg you to stop."

"I can't."

It was the truth. Whatever she wanted from him, his body, his magic, his soul, he would give it to her. She had chosen her path. There was no stopping her and no turning back. All he could do was follow her give her what she needed.

Dumbledore sank into his chair.

"Does it have to be her? There are other girls, other women. It could be arranged."

"No."

The Headmaster opened his mouth, no doubt to make some other morally reprehensible offer, but Severus cut him off.

"She chose this. Anything that happens, she does to herself. I'm not keeping her in the dungeons by force. I'm not forcing her to do anything. Anything she does, she does of her own free will."

"If anything were to happen to her, Harry would…"

"Oh, so that's what this is about, is it?"

A cold anger twisted in his gut.

"She's the most promising student to walk through these doors in decades and all you're concerned about is Potter?"

Hypocritical of him to feel anger now, especially given his own initial intentions.

Dumbledore stared at him, calm in the face of his rage.

"Potter is the best chance we have of bringing down the Dark Lord."

The rest went unspoken. Keep the boy stable and sane until the right moment for him to die, sacrifice anyone who gets in the way.

Severus turned and left the office without looking back.

x

x

Nothing. She had been through every book in the library, every book in Snape's collection, and still nothing. A few vague references to Horcruxes, but the details were always omitted. Never before had research failed her so spectacularly. Dumbledore had been thorough. He wanted this knowledge erased and he had done so. But there had to be something. She couldn't help but feel sure that he had left some small loose thread somewhere. If they could only find that thread, it would lead them to the knowledge they sought.

Snape was lecturing about something in the front of the classroom, but she wasn't listening. In her head, she once again went through what they knew. There had to be a murder, Snape had been certain of that. The killing curse had to be cast in order to split one's soul. The problem was what happened after that, how to capture the loose fragment of soul into an object. Harry knew how to destroy the Horcrux, but it was the creation of the soul-receptacle that still remained a mystery to them.

She looked up to see that the lesson had ended and the students were filing out of the classroom. _Finally._

Making her way to the front of the classroom, she stood by the Professor's desk as if waiting for him to look up from his papers so that she could ask a question. Harry dawdled in the back while the rest of the students stuffed their books into their bags with an urgency specially reserved for the Potions classroom and fled through the door without looking back.

The moment the door had closed behind the last student, Snape stood and paced across the room, throwing open the door to his office and ushering them quickly inside. Hermione had permission to be down here, but if Harry disappeared too much, the Headmaster would get suspicious. Dumbledore had already begun to make subtle comments to Harry, carefully trying to distance him from his friend. To implicate any sign of an alliance between Harry and Severus would be to split their plan wide open to the Headmaster's suspicion. Hermione passed messages back and forth between the two men, but meetings between the three of them only occurred when they could sneak brief moments away from any prying eyes.

They had maybe ten or twenty minutes before someone would realize that Harry had not left the Potions classroom. She launched into her questions.

"What have you found out from Slughorn?"

Harry ran his hand through his hair and collapsed into a chair.

"He was reluctant to talk about it. He finally admitted that there was a spell involved in the creation of a Horcrux but insisted that he didn't know it."

Her eyes narrowed.

"Do you believe him?"

"I do."

"And he told Tom Riddle the same thing?"

Her hand twitched as though wanting to take notes. They had agreed, it was too much of a risk to leave any written proof of their activities.

"Yes. Voldemort also asked Slughorn about splitting his soul more than once, which at this point is not a revelation."

"Is that all?" Snape interrupted, growing impatient with the lack of progress.

"No."

Both pairs of eyes snapped to Harry.

"What else did he say?"

"I asked him if Tom Riddle had been the only wizard…"

"And what did he say?"

"He said that Tom had been the most successful, but there were others who tried."

_Of course._ Her heart pounded with excitement. Tom Riddle hadn't been the only dark wizard in the last century. There were others, others who would know.

She glanced at the clock.

"Harry, you need to get back."

As soon as the door had shut behind him, Severus crossed the room towards her. His hand caressed her hair, smoothing the mass of curls.

"The Headmaster is concerned that I'm not taking care of you."

She ignored the tenderness in his voice, pressing her body against his.

"Then maybe you should _take care of me_," she suggested in a low whisper.

It had been too long. She had not touched him in weeks, not since they had returned to Hogwarts. She had been caught up in her research, in her experiments, and had failed to notice the stagnant need pooling in her veins. And now that she had noticed it, it felt as though she could not live one minute longer without his cock thrusting inside of her.

He seemed to know what she needed, slipping his fingers down her skirt to tease her, only allowing the tip of his finger to slip inside. He turned her in his arms and she felt his other hand behind her, fumbling with his fly and then moving in rough, regular strokes.

"The desk," He growled. "Bend over the desk."

X

X

It was foolish, reckless, something she had never been accused of being until recently. But once he had fucked her, all she could think about was having him inside her again.

They were meeting Harry, but Harry was late. Harry was always late. So she had though, just a minute, a few minutes, and he would never know. No time for a real fuck, obviously, but maybe just a little play, enough to get him hard and leave him that way so that later he would seek her out and make her pay for it.

If there was anything she had learned over the past several months, it was how to tempt him.

The kiss started off deep and slow. His tongue tangled wetly with hers. She grabbed a fistful of his dark hair as the kiss quickly grew more heated. His hand slid up the back of her bare thigh as he pulled her against him.

She let herself drown in the kiss. She let her world dissolve into pure sensation, his tongue in her mouth, his hand on her thigh.

The door latch clicked open.

Shit.

She turned to see exactly what she expected to see, Harry with his wand drawn and face filled with rage. He was across the room before she could think of anything to say. His wand pointed at Snape and her heart pounded. Several months ago she would have been sure that Harry would never...but now...

Her hand reached slowly for his arm.

"Harry," she whispered, keeping her voice low and soothing. "Harry, let's talk."

Her gaze found Severus'.

"Can you give us a few minutes. We'll discuss the Horcrux later."

He seemed to understand her need to speak to Harry about this alone and he exited the room with a curt nod. The atmosphere in the room seemed to crack with tension. Harry still hadn't looked at her.

There was a strong urge to babble, to try to get all the words out at once and then put in order later. It was an urge that had to be suppressed. If there was anything she had leaned from her years of dealing with Harry it was to let him do things in his own way, on his own time. Finally, he spoke. His first question was not the one that she had expected.

"So he's on our side, is he?"

"Yes."

He looked at her finally. His voice was calm, but his eyes were hard and challenging.

"But he wasn't at first."

She wouldn't lie to him.

"No."

"Because why would he teach us the Dark Arts when he knew how dangerous it was, when he knew what could happen?"

"He was trying to save your life, Harry."

"He was getting me ready to hand over to Voldemort."

"Yes."

"And what about you?"

"He was using me to get to you."

"And this…you and him…did it start back then?"

"Yes."

"How did it start, Hermione?"

"Harry, you're being ridiculous."

"How?" he demanded, finally releasing the anger he had held stiffly in check.

She had promised herself that she would be honest with him.

"It was the first time that I took the Devil's Eye Potion."

"So he invites a teenage girl into his quarters, gets her high, and then touches her."

She remained silent.

"And you trust this man?"

His tone was mocking and cruel, but she could hear the genuine plea for understanding underneath.

"Yes."

"He's fooling either Voldemort or Dumbledore or both, so excuse me, but he's fooled better wizards than you."

"I've touched his soul, Harry."

"What?"

"I've touched his soul. And I _know_."

She looked down at her hands, steeling herself, and then met Harry's gaze again, opening herself up to his scrutiny.

"I _know_ we can trust him."

His response caught her off-guard.

"Do you love him?"

"I...I can't really answer that."

There was a slight softening of his gaze, undetectable to any but one who had known him so well, had studied him well enough to know the signs.

And she knew in a sickening moment that he would forgive her. She knew that the boy so deprived of love as a child _had_ always…_would_ always forgive his friends. Because no matter how many times Ron had walked out or turned on Harry when he needed him the most, Harry always welcomed him back with open arms as if he felt lucky to have even this flawed, unreliable friendship. It made her feel like a horrible, horrible person.

"Hermione." The tone of his voice had changed completely. There was no anger, no accusation, only an urgent seriousness that made fear grip her stomach.

Her head shot up, giving him her full attention.

He lowered his voice almost to a whisper.

"I came to tell you that Dumbledore is taking me out of the castle. I need to go meet him. We're going after another Horcrux."

x

x

He had obviously been waiting for her.

"How is Potter?"

"He's not happy about it, but he accepts my choice. It doesn't matter now."

"What?"

"Dumbledore has taken him to find another one."

"I know."

She noticed the heavy traveling cloak that he was wearing. He was going to use Dumbledore's absence as an opportunity to slip out of the castle. She had thought they were working together, but he had obviously been making plans without her.

"Where are you going?"

"To see the second darkest wizard I know."

"Can I come?"

His gaze drifted over her, carefully taking in her eager eyes, her uniform, her young body. She wasn't sure what it was he was looking for, but he nodded sharply.

"I suppose it wouldn't hurt."

x

x

Her first impression of the rocky-windswept island was that he had brought them both to Azkaban. Her eyes wandered up the rocky cliff to the windowless black tower, almost nothing but a silhouette against the overcast sky. At the base of the tower was a solemn gate. She read the inscription as a slow shiver made its way down her spine.

This was not Azkaban.

x

x

_A/N: Ahhhh, I know, I've been bad. Far, far too long between updates. For any of you that are still reading, thanks for hanging in there. Please stick with me. I promise I'll make it through this._


	18. The Darkest Arts

Chapter 18: The Darkest Arts

"Where are we?" she whispered. There was a note of horror in her voice that let him know she had already guessed the answer. He answered her question anyway.

"Nurmengard."

Severus started up the path with a sure-footed certainty that she couldn't miss.

"You've been here before," she whispered, hurrying after him.

He paused for a moment, as his eyes swept over the desolate landscape.

"Yes. I've been here."

Who else would Albus have sent? Who else _could _he have sent? Albus needed information; he always needed information. And he certainly wasn't going to set foot on the island himself. It was one of the many errands saved just for Severus.

He could see her shiver in the harsh wind. She was, after all, still dressed in her thin school uniform while he wore his heavy cloak tightly around his shoulders. He refrained from offering it to her. She would be of more use to him dressed as she was.

He continued on through the gate and into the heavy tower, not looking back to see if she was following. A single circular staircase wound up and up and up, past empty cell after empty cell, climbing steeply to the top, to the single occupied cell, to the only living thing on the desolate island.

The staircase coiled and coiled, rising far above the rocky ground. Usually it was only his own heavy footsteps echoing in the abandoned tower. This time, a second, lighter pattern filled the silent gaps between.

He reached the top first. The old man had heard the footsteps echoing up the void and was waiting for him with that same detached yet expectant look he always had. She emerged in the top chamber a few seconds later, her face flushed from the climb and her curls blown loose by the wind. She stayed near the entrance to the stairway, positioning herself slightly behind Severus as she took in the scene.

He knew what she would see, what he himself had seen on his first visit: a withered old man, ruined by his own ambition. She would see the emaciated, wrinkled body, the shaking hands, the missing teeth. Only the sharp gleam in the man's eyes belied any trace of the fact that he had nearly brought the world to its knees.

Those dark eyes stared at Severus for a long moment. It was a deep, penetrating look. Then his eyes shifted slightly and his expression changed as he took in the girl behind. His gaze devoured her hungrily, like a man who hadn't seen a woman in over half a century. In his peripheral vision, Severus could see her fidget slightly under the intensity of the man's stare.

"Gellert Grindelwald, I'd like you to meet Miss Hermione Granger."

Grindelwald's gaze finally returned to Severus as he eyed him speculatively.

"She's young," he rasped.

"She is."

"Your student?"

"Yes."

The corner of the old man's lip twitched in a half-smirk.

"Good for you."

Severus let his blank mask slip just enough so that the other man could see the faintest hint of amusement.

"Does your employer know?"

"My _employer_ has little choice in the matter."

The old man lowered himself into the rickety wooden chair with a frailness that belied the toll of years of imprisonment.

"Ah, so you finally figured out how much he needs you. Good boy."

Only a man as deranged as he could have formed any sort of affection for the wizard who came to torture him regularly. The interrogations had become somewhat of a game, with Grindelwald smugly trying to withhold information and Snape experimenting with new and inventing ways of retrieving it from him. And always, Grindelwald taunted the younger man, calling him Albus' whipping boy. It was a sneering, sarcastic camaraderie that either man would hesitate to call friendship.

A rasping, bitter cough filled the musty air.

"But you didn't come here just to show off your little treat, did you?"

"No. No, I didn't."

The truth was that he hated coming here. Looking through the bars, he could only see himself. This man terrified him in a way that Voldemort never had. Voldemort was a psychopath; Grindelwald was a clever, talented wizard, who had been drawn to the Dark and had tried to remake the world as he saw fit.

Severus moved forward and settled himself onto the other wooden chair, facing the old man through the bars. Hermione remained behind him, by the door to the staircase, thankfully taking the hint to stay silent and out of the way. She had already served her purpose here.

"What do you know of Horcruxes?"

The old man let out a dry laugh. The laugh came to an abrupt end and was replaced by a suspicious silence.

"Does Albus know you're here?"

"He does not."

The old man shook his head and let out a deep sigh.

"Horcruxes." He stopped and shook his head again. "You came here to ask me about Horcruxes. I don't have any, if that's what you're asking. If I did, I would have found a way to kill myself long ago and retrieve some other life somewhere else."

"Did you ever try?"

He lifted his head and looked at Severus through haunted eyes.

"Of course I tried. How could I resist?"

"What happened?"

"What do you _think_ happened? I failed. And it ripped my soul to shreds."

"Where did you learn how to do it? Where did you find the spells?"

The old man hesitated, staring for a moment at the dirty floor.

"There was a book, _Secrets of the Darkest Arts_. It contained instructions. I found a copy in the library of Hogwarts and copied down the spells. It was rumored to be the only remaining copy of the book. The last I saw it, Albus had it in his possession."

"At Hogwarts?"

"No. No, he wouldn't risk so many people being so close. He would want it somewhere where he would have complete control over it."

Severus leaned forward in his seat. He could feel every beat of his heart pound against his ribcage. Close, they were finally getting close.

"Do you know where the book is?"

"No."

The old man had that look, the one he knew well, the one that meant that he had something else that he was withholding, stringing out the questioning, flexing the only small degree of power he still had left.

"But I have a guess."

"Go on."

"Albus inherited a property on the coast of Norway from his grandfather. We went there once."

"Show me."

Grindelwald quickly broke eye contact, staring determinedly at the dirty floor. Severus leaned closer to the man, lowering his voice.

"I wouldn't be here if this wasn't important."

The old man raised his head, locking eyes with his questioner and giving one short decisive nod. Severus wasted no time, wordlessly casting the spell and slipping into the other man's mind with no resistance.

Another tower on another rocky coast. Fitting. The tower was white, lower and wider that Nuremgard, less of a prison and more of a stronghold. Then the vision moved away from the tower, a road, a lake, a turn in the road, a village…

He pulled out with a suddenness that made the other man gasp.

Severus stood. They had the information they needed and they couldn't afford to waste any more time. Grindelwald stood too, coming forward as much as his cell would allow and grasping one of the bars that imprisoned him.

"Albus' skill with wards is…"

"I know."

He turned, motioning to Hermione to start back down the stairs. She began the descent and he was about to follow when the old man called out one final time, his haunted words echoing off the stones.

"Severus. The Darkness, don't let it take you…not like it took me."

x

x

* * *

A/N: Reviews...please!


	19. The Lightning Struck Tower

Chapter 19: The Lightning-Struck Tower

x

x

Every moment that passed bought with it a deep sense of dread. The room was filled with a nervous energy, both restrained and amplified by the necessary inactivity.

It had been four silent hours since Harry had left with Dumbledore in search of the final Horcrux. Four hours of waiting.

Hermione sat still, determined not to move while Severus paced back and forth across the small space like a caged animal. It was grating on her tightly strung nerves and her fingers twitched toward her wand with the impulse to Stupify him.

The door finally opened without warning, allowing Harry to slip quickly inside before closing it behind him. Hermione could not stop herself from lurching towards her friend.

He held up one hand, motioning for her to keep back.

It was only then that she registered anything beyond his simple physical presence. Harry looked terrible. There was no other way to describe it. His clothing was torn in places, revealing singed flesh and blood. She itched to heal him, to make it alright, but he looked at her steadily with his hand still raised.

"We got the last one. It's just me now…and Voldemort."

His gaze traveled from her to Severus.

"What did you find?"

"We have a lead…the location of a book that contains instructions for making a Horcrux."

"Great. Let's get it."

"It's not that simple, Potter."

Harry allowed himself to collapse onto a chair and let out a short, bitter laugh.

"It never is, is it?"

He allowed his eyes to slip closed for a moment, but then opened them again in full alertness.

"What's the problem?"

"The book is being kept on Dumbledore's property. None of us have been there before so Apparition is out of the question. A portkey is out for similar reasons, as well as the magical trace. The only way to go is by broomstick and even then it's a two day journey at best."

Severus buried his face in his hand and rubbed his brow.

"I can fake a call from the Dark Lord and disappear for a few days. Dumbledore will be suspicious, but he won't act until he's sure."

It was unbelievable to her that after all they had been through, he would still contemplate going alone.

"And then what?" she interrupted fiercely, "What will you do once you're there? You don't even know what you'll encounter with the wards, but chances are they'll be more than one person can get through."

He shook his head.

"You're two of the most highly visible students in the school. Your absence would be noticed and we have no good excuse to explain it afterward. Dumbledore would suspect betrayal."

She crossed the room towards him, slowly untying her tie as she walked. As she reached him, she let it slide through her fingers and onto the desk into a coiled pile of red and gold.

"Then it is time to give up the pretense of being students."

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Harry approach and a second tie joined hers on the desk.

"She's right. The Horcruxes are gone. We don't need Dumbledore's help anymore. The longer we stay, the longer we risk him finding out our plan. We've gotten what we needed from Hogwarts. It's time to leave."

The considering look in his eye let her know that he saw the logic of the argument. The end game was approaching and the three of them would need to be together to stand a chance. If Dumbledore started to suspect Snape, he would soon suspect her, and soon after, Harry. They were better off getting out of the grasp of the old wizard while they still could. She pressed on. "Dumbledore will know we've gone, but he doesn't know where we're going. He won't be able to find us until it's too late."

Severus nodded, turning to Harry.

"Where is he right now?"

"He was injured. He called Madam Pomfrey to his office."

"How badly injured?"

"Badly. He'll survive, but he won't be leaving his rooms tonight."

They watched the professor's back as he stared silently out the window for a few minutes. Then he turned with a suddenness of purpose, already striding across the room as he spoke.

"Take only what you need. Leave everything else. Meet me at the gates in twenty minutes."

Their visit to Gryfindor Tower was surprisingly brief. Hermione was dismayed at how few of her possessions she actually needed when it really came down to it.

It didn't hit her until they reached the front doors of the castle that this was most likely the last time she would ever set foot in Hogwarts. She forced herself to push the doors open and continue through. The plan had been set into motion and there was nowhere to go but forward.

It wasn't until they passed through the front gate that Harry turned back to the castle with a longing gaze. This had been the first home he had ever known. She was sure he had never imagined leaving it like a fugitive sneaking away under the cover of darkness in the dead of night. She hadn't either. She had imagined a triumphant graduation and tearful goodbyes. She had imagined a diploma.

She took hold of Harry's hand and they moved forward into the darkness.

X

X

Severus was waiting for them just beyond the gate. She wondered how he had imagined leaving this place for the final time. The castle had been his home far longer than it had been hers or Harry's. He stood with his broom between his legs, poised for action.

She searched his face for any clue as to how he was feeling, but found nothing.

Without warning, he took off into the darkness, leaving her and Harry staring after him. She had thought that she would fly with Severus.

"Hurry," Harry whispered and she slipped on the broom behind him. He gave her only a moment to get settled before the ground started slipping quickly away from them.

They flew in the direction Severus had gone and slowly a shape came into focus, a black shape against the black of the night.

X

X

Daybreak found them high above France. It would have been faster to simply cross the North Sea, but the risk of flying for long distances without any land in sight were simply too great.

In the late afternoon, exhaustion set in. Severus flew close and signaled a descent. Harry followed as he found a secluded spot of the beach, tucked among the cliffs and landed.

Hermione climbed off the broom, shaky on her legs from hours and hours of flying. The beach was made up of pale rocks the size of her fist, washed smooth by the ocean. She watched as Severus disappeared wordlessly into a shallow cave in the rock and Harry followed. She squinted out over the waves, but there was nothing to see except the flat blue expanse slamming into the horizon.

Finally she entered the cave to find both men asleep on opposite sides. She eyed the patch of dirt next to Severus before the settled on the ground in the center of the cave. It was not the most comfortable place she had ever rested, but a sleepless night on a broom meant that she was asleep within minutes.

She was awoken by a hand gently shaking her shoulder. Her eyes opened to find Harry staring down at her.

Severus was standing outside the cave when they emerged. It was impossible to tell exactly how much time had passed, but the fact that the sun was still up meant that it could not have been long.

"We need to keep going," Severus stated quietly, staring out over the Ocean. She stretched once, feeling the cave floor and the hours or broom-riding deep in her bones. And then they were off, flying through the whole next day.

x

x

Night had fully fallen by the time they reached the tower, but the moon was bright, illuminating the expanse of the low, round structure. It was an ancient stronghold, built to withstand invasion. They circled once, noting that there were no openings of any kind at the base. The lack of accessible openings meant that it was not built by muggles. Wizards would have put the entrance at the top to ensure that only those with some means of flight would be able to access it.

Severus signaled and they followed his flight up onto the top of the battlement.

Hermione dismounted the broom, both thrilled to once again have something solid beneath her feet and terrified of what they were about to do. She pushed her fear aside and removed a vial from her robes.

There was a single door into the tower. It was thick metal, cast with scenes from mythology, some of which she recognized and others she did not. Her fingers traced the metal figures, feeling both the wear of age in them and the magic they hid. She stared at the door with a sense of purpose. They were close. For years she had existed in a state in which it seemed as though this war would never end, that it was simply a way of life. But now, on the other side of that door was a book that would tell them how to get Voldemort's soul out of Harry, that would allow the evil wizard to be killed once and for all. For the first time it seemed like there might actually be an end to this hell, that there might be an after.

The weather shifted suddenly and against the moonlit sky she could see shadows as dark clouds began to gather. She could hear the wind before she felt it, rustling the distant trees.

She tipped back the vial and let the familiar taste trickle down her throat. Opening her eyes to the woven magic of Dumbledore's wards. She had never seen anything like it. The intricacy and precision with which they were woven far surpassed anything she could have guessed.

She skimmed her magic gently along them, testing and teasing, but it got her nowhere. The strands weren't just looped together, but were knotted tightly in patterns she had never seen. If she was even going to have a chance at unraveling them, she would need to use more force. She let go of the strand and stepped away, facing the two men that watched her expectantly.

"He's going to know if we tamper with the wards. He's going to know that someone is trying to breach his tower."

Severus turned to stare over the parapet out across the vast landscape as the wind whipped his dark hair against his face.

"Let him come," he stated plainly, "There is no reason to pretend any longer."

He turned toward her, looking her straight in the eye.

"Bring down the wards."

x

x

He watched as she turned back toward the door and reached for the wards. He could see the strain in her already. Whatever this was that they were up against, it would be a battle.

Her curls blew wildly in the wind as she worked, teasing and testing the strands. Her silhouette against the bright night appeared both powerful and delicate. He was struck suddenly by the thought that he had created this being, had taken an innocent schoolgirl and turned her into a fearsome witch. But he knew that was wrong. She had never been as innocent as he had imagined and she had made her own choices. He had merely set things into motion. And now there was no turning back. The plan had been made and there was no choice other than to see it through to completion.

Snape was startled from his thought by a sharp crack behind him. He turned into the sharp blue gaze of Albus Dumbledore. There was no trace of the customary good-natured amusement in the old man's face, only a fierce intelligence. The gaze rested first on Harry and then on Hermione and the vial at her feet before it settled on Severus.

The only thing he could read in it was disappointment.

"After all these years, Severus? After everything I have done for you?"

It was the last thing he had expected the old man to say. He let out a bitter, desperate, incredulous laugh. "Everything_ you_ have done for _me_?"

Dumbledore's disappointment snapped suddenly into anger as he raised his voice above the howling wind. "I kept you out of Azkaban. I thought I could trust you around children."

"They aren't children."

"You have corrupted them. Both of them. Our greatest hopes for the future and you have led them into the Darkness."

Something snapped within him, unleashing years of resentment for being used, years of being blamed and forced to feel guilty.

"Greatest hopes for the future?_ You meant for him to die._"

The old man didn't even have the grace to look ashamed.

"It is the only way and you know it."

He was not aware of drawing his wand, but it was suddenly in his grasp, pointed at the old wizard with the one word he had never said.

"No."

"You seek to help Tom win?" His wand too was out in an instant, pointed at his traitorous spy.

"The Dark Lord needs to be stopped, but there has to be another way."

"Harry must die. I explained this to you Severus. It is the _only_ way."

Severus glanced to his side to see the boy staring at the man who had once been his mentor. They had told him the plan, of course, but be was obviously shocked to hear it spoken by the wizard himself.

"There is another way. We can transfer the piece of the Dark Lord's soul into another container…into something we can destroy. You can help us."

"Do you have _any idea_ what you're proposing? I thought you had learned your lesson about the Dark Arts. Meddling with souls, Severus? That is a dangerous thing to be attempting."

"Keep going, Hermione," he called, noticing that she had stopped. The sound of a glass vial shattering against stone rang out, letting him know that she had taken a second dose. He moved his body between her and the enraged wizard, praying he could hold off the old man long enough to give her the time she needed to break the wards. But Dumbledore seemed not to notice her, or was too confident of his own wards to consider that an eighteen-year-old girl might be able to dismantle them. Instead the old man focused his attention on his former spy.

"Why, Severus?"

His fist tightened around his wand.

"Because I didn't protect Lily's only son all these years just to lead him to slaughter at the right moment."

"Still for Lily, Severus, after all these years?"

"Not for _her_, not anymore."

He knew as he spoke the words that they were true. He would see this through or he would die trying, but he was no longer trying hopelessly to win the love of a dead woman.

"You've learned nothing. In all this time, you've learned nothing."

"I've learned more than you think."

"You've never learned your lesson about the Dark Arts. You cannot fight Tom Riddle using his own power. You cannot fight him with the Dark Arts. If something were to go wrong, it could unleash terrible power on the world."

"You mean if the part of the Dark Lord were to take over the whole of Potter's soul?"

"That is exactly what I mean. Do you have _any_ idea what would happen if that were to occur?"

"Some idea, yes."

"Do you have any idea how powerful he and Tom would be together? There would be no stopping them."

"Then we will take precautions to ensure that that does not happen."

"And even if it does work, what next? What's to stop you, the three of you, after you have this knowledge, after making this first Horcrux…what's to stop you from making more? What's to stop you from splitting your own souls? From seeking your own immortality?"

"Sanity and self-control."

"It is too dangerous. I forbid it. We have a responsibility. We must set an example. To bring the Dark Arts out in the open like this, to unleash that sort of knowledge on the world…It is unthinkable."

"It must be done."

"You will have to kill me first."

"You say that as if you think I won't do it."

He wasn't sure which of them fired the first hex, only that one was fired. A red bolt struck one of the merlons, sending it plummeting down into the darkness below.

He heard Hermione call to him from out of sight.

"I can't figure out these wards. I've never seen wards like this before."

"I told you that you would have to kill me. No one enters without my permission. The wards are tied to my magic. The only way the wards fall is if I do."

"That can be arranged."

He heard a choked gasp behind him, but could not turn to see. He did not need to. He already knew that she had taken too much of the potion, that he body would be starting to shut down.

"Potter," he screamed over the wind. "There is a blue potion in her cloak. Force it down her throat." He knew if he moved his gaze from Dumbledore even for a second, that he would be dead.

He threw another hex that the old man swiftly deflected. Dumbledore retaliated, figing hex after hex as Severus screamed instructions to Potter on how to stabalize his friend.

"I've done all I can. The rest of it is tied to his magic. We don't get in unless he permits."

Blood pooled out of the old man, forming a puddle that looked almost black in the colorless moonlight.

The white wand tumbled and rolled across the stone surface and then came to an abrupt stop as a foot descended on it.

Harry slowly reached down and picked up the wand, holding the long piece of wood in his left hand as he gazed down on it.

"Harry. Help me."

He shook his head.

"After everything we have been through together?"

"Everything we've…you want me to die. You want Voldemort to kill me."

"You must understand, Harry. So many lives depend on it. For your death to mean so much, to save so many people..."

"For the greater good, you mean," Severus snarled, but Dumbledore ignored him.

"Don't be selfish, Harry. Think of your friends. They could be living in a world without Voldemort."

"You have one last chance to let us enter," Severus interrupted.

The kindly tone that Dumbledore had been using with Harry momentarily turned cold.

"Never. I will die before I willingly hand over that book to you. I will die before I allow the Dark Arts to be used in this manner."

His gaze returned to the boy he had controlled for nearly seven years.

"You were meant for this, Harry. The prophecy, your life has been leading to this noble sacrifice. You alone have the power to stop him."

"My parents…my parents died to save me. They didn't save me for _this_."

"Harry, my wand."

For a split-second it seemed as if Harry was going to comply, but abruptly he turned his back towards his former mentor and stared blankly at the gathering clouds in the distance. He spoke not to Dumbledore, but to Snape.

"Kill him. We need the book."

Nothing personal, for the greater good.

The first drop of rain fell.

Severus wanted to shut his eyes, to turn away even as he cast the spell, but he forced himself to keep them open, to watch the horror on the man's face as he uttered the words.

"_Avada Kedavara_."

Pain shot through him, cold and sharp. It was as if he had plunged head-first into an ice-cold lake. He struggled for breath. It was not the first time he had cast the spell, nor the second, nor third, nor fourth. It would get easier, one would think, but it only seemed to get harder. He wasn't even sure if he could count all the pieces of his shattered soul.

x

x

_A/N: Yes, yes I did. Back near the beginning of the story, I wasn't sure where this was all going to go. Then I realized that after all Severus has been through, I wanted to read a story where he kills Dumbledore and means it. Don't hate me!  
_

_Well, for everyone who was concerned that the story was abandoned, it's not! I just had to stop writing entirely while I finished graduate school, but I've graduated now and started writing again. I have my degree and everything. I'm not saying that this story will be finished quickly, but it will be finished. Thanks for sticking with me. Your reviews give me the motivation that I need to write._

_Also, I need ideas: What object would Harry pick to create the Horcrux? (Something of sentimental value to him? Something he hates and wants to destroy? Something ordinary that means nothing?)_


	20. Horcrux

Chapter 20: Horcrux

Her first sensation was pain, a dull ache throughout every inch of her body. She took a deep breath, noting the scent of parchment and minerals in the air as she forced her lungs painfully to expand.

Her face against a stone floor.

Candle wax.

And footsteps. The sound of footsteps.

One-two-three-four-five. One-two-three-four-five. One-two-three-four-five.

Pacing.

She forced her eyelids apart and watched the feet move in and out of her view.

Sneakers.

Harry.

"What…" she managed to whisper as the memory of where they were and what had been happening when she blacked out came flooding back to her.

The pacing stopped and Harry's face popped into view. He looked both relieved and terrified.

"Oh thank Merlin. Are you alright?"

And his hand pressed to her forehead as if she were a sick child and he were her mother. She tried to smile but didn't quite manage it.

He helped her pull herself up into a sitting position as all her muscles protested.

Her mouth felt dry, stuffed full of cottonballs.

"Where's Severus?"

"He wouldn't come inside."

She closed her eyes again, trying to gather herself together.

"Dumbledore's dead," Harry whispered into the silence. It was obvious that the admission was as much for himself as it was for her.

"I know."

She opened her eyes.

"Do you have the book?"

"Yes." He nodded toward a large, leather-bound volume on the floor.

"We can't stay here." Her gaze drifted to the door. "_He_ can't stay here."

Where could they go? It hit her suddenly that they had just murdered Albus Dumbledore. Would the Aurors be looking for them? All three of them had been missing from Hogwarts for days, surely someone would put it together.

It was Harry that came up with the first idea.

"Grimmauld. We can go to Grimmauld."

It was not exactly the best location for a hideout, but it was the only place they had.

Strong arms lifted her to her feet and supported her limping gait out the door and into the elements. The driving rain hit her like a physical force and only Harry's steady embrace kept her upright. She stopped cold at what she saw.

The man was bent down against one of the low stone walls, huddled against the elements and against the torrent of his own soul.

Harry stood with the large book clutched tightly under his jacket as Hermione knelt beside Severus, whispering words of comfort into the man's ear. He flinched away from her, trembling.

She reached down and pulled his head up with both her hands even as he tried to pull away. He was cold, so cold. She pressed her lips against his forehead and and his cheek and his nose and his lips. And his lips. He was unresponsive, but she caressed his lips with her own. She had to get him away from here.

Squinting her eyes against the storm, she looked up at Harry.

_Can you Apparate us_ she mouthed, knowing the sound would be lost in the howling wind. _I don't think that I can._

She encircled Severus in her arms as Harry encircled her. There was the sensation of warmth and safety for a brief moment before the sudden flurry of apparition.

They appeared on the doorstep. Harry moved his wand in a few jerky motions and then tried to open the door. It seemed not to budge and he tried again, this time shoving his shoulder against it. The door swung free of the frame with a loud creak, stirring up a cloud of dust from within. Since Sirius' death, since the students had returned to Hogwarts, Order meetings had been held at the Burrow more often than not, leaving Grimmauld Place to fall into a state of disuse. It now looked much as they had originally found it.

Severus leaned heavily on her as she tried to support him. She could feel him shaking. Harry positioned himself under Snape's other arm as the two of them tried to move him forward and into the house.

Without speaking, they maneuvered him toward the staircase. "I'm losing him," she gasped as he slid away from her. Harry braced himself against the railing, catching the full weight of the larger man. They had to work for several minutes to all get upright again. The top of the stairs seemed like an impossible destination, but they eventually made it.

She picked the first bedroom they came to, the one with the bathroom attached. His robes were soaked through and his skin was cold to the touch.

They lowered him into the bathtub. Hermione moved back into the doorframe as Harry got him settled, trying to collect herself for a moment.

He stopped as he passed her, laying a reassuring hand on her arm as he exited the room. She fell into his arms, comforted by the strength and the warmth she found there. She laid her head on his shoulder, allowing herself to give in momentarily to the despair before she pulled herself together for what needed to be done.

She stepped back from her friend, wiping a tear from her cheek and noticing for the first time the accumulation of injuries he had sustained over the preceding days. Her eyes scanned his body, noting the various cuts and burns. He noticed her gaze and when she started to say, "Are you…" he shook his head and took a step toward the door.

"I can take care of myself, Hermione. Go help Snape."

He shut the door softly behind him.

Taking a deep breath, she turned back into the bathroom and to the unconscious man in the tub.

As she walked, she stripped off her sodden clothing, leaving them discarded on the dusty tiles on the floor. Fortunately, the tub filled quickly with hot water.

She climbed in, kneeling between his legs as she unbuttoned his shirt and forced it off over his shoulders. He shuddered slightly but was otherwise unresponsive.

She pressed both hands flat against his chest and closed her eyes, reaching for the unseen. There was a sharp gasp in front of her and she opened her eyes in time to see his shoot open. But as suddenly as they had opened, they rolled back in his head and shut again and his head fell back, making a sharp thunk against the rim of the tub. She took a deep breath and focused.

She had one vial left with her. Her hand groped along the floor until she felt her discarded robes. The vial was still there in the inner pocket. She withdrew it and downed the contents in one gulp, feeling the warmth quickly flood her body.

He was alert enough by now to follow her lead out of the tub and into the bed. He lay on the thin sheets as the water from his skin soaked into them. She didn't dare use magic to dry them. She climbed into bed with him, pressing her body to his.

"Hermione," he whispered her name in a groan of pain.

She ran her hands across his slippery skin.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm bringing you back."

If you could even call it that. She was patching him together. It was rough and dirty, but it would hold.

She knelt between his legs, droplets from her sopping hair dripping onto his skin. The artificial confidence of the potion told her she could make this work. It strummed in her veins and set her on fire. She had ingested far too much of it in the last twenty-four hours. His penis was limp and unresponsive, but she took it in her hand and began to stroke. Her other hand reaching for his balls and massaging them gently. She was relieved when she finally felt him start to harden in her grasp.

Her wet skin slid against his, close, but not close enough. She positioned herself over him and sunk down, impaling herself on his cock at the same time she reached for his soul. His eyes opened suddenly, his gaze sharp and alert.

"What are you doing?" he asked again.

"I'm bringing you back."

The morning light streamed through the crack in the heavy drapery, a single, brilliant ray against the dark, dusty carpeting. She dragged herself out of bed, feeling every muscle protest. It had been a long night.

Her clothes from the night before had not dried, being left in a heap on the bathroom floor all night. She supposed she could spell-dry them, but it seemed like less work to open the dresser and rummage through until she found a spare shirt that someone had left there during the summer. She pulled her hair back into a messy ponytail and sat down on the side of the bed, sliding her finger to Severus' neck. His pulse was still fast, too fast, and his skin was pale. She hoped that whatever she had done had worked, but she couldn't be sure. He groaned and shifted in his sleep, as if fighting an invisible battle of which she could be no part.

She opened the door carefully as not to wake him and slipped out into the hall. She was surprised to see Harry there, waiting for her. She could tell from the way his gaze tightened as it surveyed her body that she looked terrible.

"You were waiting for me?" she prompted him."

"I was just thinking... when Dumbledore doesn't return to Hogwarts in a few days, the Order is going to go looking for him. When he died, every member of the Order was made a secret keeper. If they look for him, they're going to come here."

She rubbed her eyes.

"There's a book on magical property ownership on the bottom shelf of the bookcase, right inside the door that you should check. I think the exact phrasing of the Fidelus Charm was, 'The Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix is Number 12 Grimmauld Place.' I think, as the property owner, that you have the right to revoke the building's status as the Order Headquarters, which would revoke their access."

Harry seemed to be keeping up.

"So if Grimmauld Place is no longer the Order Headquarters, the existing Fidelus charm ceases to apply, therefore leaving the building free to have another Fidelus charm placed on it."

"Exactly. But you probably want to check the procedure in the book."

She turned to head back into the bedroom.

"Hermione."

She turned around.

"How…how is he?"

She shook her head.

"Not good."

x

x

It took Severus two days to be able to leave the bedroom. He had but a few blissful moments alone with his coffee before Potter appeared in the doorway.

Potter entered the kitchen, but simply stood near the stove, watching him. Severus brought the mug of coffee slowly to his lips. His hand trembled as he sipped the warm liquid and he placed it carefully back on the table.

He looked like shit. Why did Potter have to see him like this? He had chanced a glance in a mirror of the way downstairs and had caught a glimpse of the bloodshot eyes and the dingy stubble that defined his appearance.

But Potter was looking at him with neither mockery nor pity. His gaze held in it a sort of horrified awe.

"Is that what it's like…to rip one's soul?"

"Yes." His voice sounded ragged, even to his own ears.

"Will it be like that…for me?"

"No, not if all goes according to plan. You are separating your soul along the weak points, your own soul will remain intact and the excess piece…the Dark Lord's will be splintered off."

"But there's still a risk…that my soul will fracture in a different spot?"

"Yes."

He stared down at his hands, willing them to stop their slight tremor. There was no use lying, no use trying to sugar-coat anything. The boy needed to be prepared for the harsh reality of what he was facing.

"Sir, I realize what you've done for me."

He looked up into the earnest gaze.

"I know you've always thought I was ungrateful, but I'm not."

Potter turned away suddenly and busied himself with making tea. And then the tea sat steaming silently as the young man stared distantly out the window.

"When the time comes for me to cast it…what if I can't?" he asked without turning around.

Severus stared silently at the younger man's back for a few moments.

"You lack neither the ability nor the necessary intent. The Dark Lord has been hunting you since you were born. He killed your parents. He … He… Do you honestly think that you wouldn't be able to summon enough hatred?"

"No, but the others…the Horcruxes…they didn't want to be destroyed. They resisted with whatever they had. This piece of his soul…it's still a part of me and what if…" The boy turned suddenly, meeting his eyes with a gaze that burned, "What if when the time comes, I don't want it to be destroyed?"

He stared into those green eyes silently for several long moments.

"Then I will destroy you."

And the eyes showed neither sorrow nor fear.

"Do I have your word?"

"Yes."


End file.
